How has the Microsoft Redmond campus footprint and building count changed over time?
Executive summary
Microsoft’s Redmond headquarters began as a modest suburban move in 1986 and has grown, by multiple waves of construction, into a roughly 500‑acre, multi‑million‑square‑foot campus whose building count and footprint have been repeatedly reshaped by expansions in 1992, the mid‑2000s, and the multi‑year “refresh” that began in 2017; today reporting places the campus in the 8–10 million square foot range across roughly 500 acres while older low‑rise X‑shaped buildings have been torn down and replaced with denser, modern structures [1] [2] [3] [4]. Sources disagree on precise totals and dates for every phase, but together they trace a clear arc from small corporate HQ to megacampus undergoing large‑scale modernization [1] [5] [3].
1. From a small HQ to a suburban campus: the 1986 origin and early growth
Microsoft moved its headquarters to Redmond in February 1986 and began building the original X‑shaped low‑rise office buildings that defined the campus’s early footprint [1] [6] [7]. The initial site was developed on land that had been a farm and ranch, and the original campus architecture and landscaping set the pattern for Microsoft’s forested suburban headquarters in the decades that followed [8] [9].
2. The first major expansion: 1992 brings large acreage and more square footage
The first large expansion is recorded as occurring in 1992, when Microsoft increased office space substantially—sources describe a jump to about 1.7 million square feet across roughly 260 acres—establishing Redmond as the company’s long‑term base for growth [1]. That move cemented the company’s plan to concentrate future growth in Redmond rather than dispersing its core operations elsewhere [1].
3. The mid‑2000s buildout: a billion‑dollar push and millions more square feet
Microsoft’s next big surge began around 2006 under a 20‑year development agreement with Redmond, a push that added roughly 2.2–3.1 million square feet (different reports use slightly different figures) and created room for thousands more employees; this phase included the West Campus and new specialty buildings such as Building 99 for Microsoft Research [3] [10] [11]. Reporting from the period frames this as the last major campus expansion before the 2017 refresh, and it materially enlarged the campus footprint and building inventory [3] [10].
4. Growth to a megacampus: acreage and square‑foot tallies in recent reporting
By the 2010s and early 2020s Microsoft’s Redmond presence is commonly described as occupying about 500 acres and approaching 8–10 million square feet of office space, making it comparable in scale to large university campuses; different outlets report totals at the lower end (8+ million) or the higher end (close to 10 million), reflecting differences in what is counted as “office space” and the timing of renovations and demolitions [2] [1] [12].
5. The 2017 refresh and the new master plan: demolition, densification and new buildings
Beginning with a 2017 program often called the “campus refresh” or redevelopment, Microsoft committed to replacing a set of older buildings (commonly cited as 12 older structures, including many of the original X‑shaped buildings) with a smaller number of larger, denser new buildings—examples include proposals to replace 12 buildings with roughly 17–18 new structures and to add about 2.5–3 million square feet of modern office space while renovating millions more [4] [5] [3] [11]. Local planning pages and company communications describe specific subprojects such as the RedWest South expansion (four new buildings plus parking) and the pedestrian bridge linking east and west campuses, evidence that the refresh is both consolidation and growth [13] [14].
6. Counting buildings versus footprint: why totals vary and what’s certain
Numbers in public reporting vary because sources count different things—gross versus rentable square footage, whether renovated space is counted as “new,” and whether off‑campus properties and satellite sites are included—so totals range from “over 8 million” to “close to 10 million” square feet and from several dozen to many dozens of individual buildings depending on the cutoff [1] [2] [3]. What is clear from municipal records and Microsoft’s own materials is a consistent trajectory: the campus footprint expanded markedly from the 1990s and 2000s, then shifted after 2017 toward demolition and replacement with fewer, larger, and more modern buildings while keeping—or modestly increasing—overall square footage and densifying the site [4] [3] [11].