The proportion of rural population is decreasing all over Europe and the young and highly-qualified are the first to leave. At the same time the economy is changing toward a more creative conceptual age; routine task are being replaced by creative and flexible activities. According to Richard Florida's three T’s economic growth theory, main drivers of development are technologies, tolerance and the creative class and talent – well educated people dealing with creative or conceptual tasks in their professional life. Although the concept of creative class is most commonly associated with large cities, the nature of creative work allows employees and their tasks to be distributed across settings away from a physical business location (i.e. a central office). Undoubtedly, the concentration of resources in the agglomerations brings benefits to the economy. At the same time, the information and communication technologies allow reaching the concentration of resources not only physically, but also virtually (digitally). The centrifugal forces play a role, e.g. the rise of the rent of land and such externalities as the noise, pollution, stress etc. For example, since the year 2000 Sweden is experiencing a tendency of young families with children and elderly people moving from cities to rural areas. The main cause behind this life-cycle related migration is high living costs and expensive real estate in cities, proximity to nature, as well as children-friendly social and cultural environment. Smart work centers, shared office spaces with information and communication technologies that support distant work, have been established in several European countries (United Kingdom, Hungary, Estonia, France etc.) in order to increase economic activity and sustain local populations in rural areas. In some cases smart work centers have been established by the regional and local authorities (e.g. Berwick WorkSpace in United Kingdom and smart work center Nagykáta in Hungary), in some cases by local NGO’s (e.g. Kõnnu and Kolga smart work centers in Estonia). Accordingly they differ significantly in their size. Some of the centers are integrated with business incubation services, some offer training, some child care facilities. Smart work centers bring benefits to employees, employers, local communities. Employees get the chance to live in a more peaceful, natural environment, decrease their commuting time, achieve a better work-life balance etc. Employers on the other hand can achieve decreased personnel and operating costs and recruit better motivated employees. The local municipalities and communities can achieve an increased perception of the quality of life, advance economic activity and consequently local budget income. Moreover, smart work centers, especially those established as a bottom-up initiative, increase local social capital. To conclude, smart work contributes to sustaining the rural populations and counterbalancing the concentration of economic activity in the metropolitan areas. However, further research is required in order to offer sustainable solutions for smart work in rural areas.