Global call center market size 2020-2027

The global contact center market size amounted to almost 340 billion U.S. dollars in 2020. The industry was expected to grow steadily in the following years to reach a value of 496 billion U.S. dollars by 2027. Despite this expected financial growth, the total number of call center employees worldwide fell in 2021.

U.S. call centers

In the United States, the number of call center employees had been growing steadily between 2014 and 2020, however the industry took a significant hit following the COVID-19 outbreak in March 2020. In 2020 and 2021, the number of contact center employees receded for the first time since 2014. Regardless of the numbers of those employed, wages were generally higher for some call center workers in 2021 than they were in 2020.

An industry in decline?

As demonstrated, the number of call center employees declined globally since the outbreak of the coronavirus in 2020. The industry that was hit the hardest in terms of numbers of new jobs created was business process outsourcing, with almost half as many new jobs created in 2021 than in 2020. Call center industries that were still able to create more new jobs in 2021 than in 2020 were in travel, collections, utilities, and automotives.