The latest floor space and employment survey compiled by the City of Sydney shows there has been a 15 per cent rise in the number of jobs in the inner city in the five years to 2017.

The growth has been greatest in business services, property, finance and tech industries. But it's also been spread across the CBD, as well as emerging job hubs in Surry Hills, Ultimo and Pyrmont.

The figures showed inner Sydney's workforce had grown by 66,017 extra workers since 2012, or about 13,000 jobs per year in that time.

About 40 council staff spent 10 months examining 60,000 buildings and businesses to find out how many jobs were created in different industries, and how much space workers used.

The audit, done every five years, provides insight into how the city's business landscape is changing.

It also generates a vast amount of information about that helps the city plan around business and residential growth.

The survey showed 23,511 businesses in the centre of Sydney now employ 501,786 people - the first time the number of workers in the city has passed half a million.

In that same period, the amount of business floor space had increased 744,000 square metres, or 4.5 per cent, which was well behind the rate of employment growth.

"This means we have more people working in less space which is a result of the continued popularity of open plan offices," the City of Sydney's urban analytics manager Steven Hillier said.

Pyrmont, which has become a hub for tech businesses, creative industries and higher education and research has experienced the biggest jump in employees in the past decade.

The number of workers in the Harris Street precinct has risen from 19,864 in 2007 to 34,982 in 2017 - an increase of 76 per cent.

Creative industries have also been drawn to the area around Crown Street and Baptist Street in Surry Hills, where worker numbers have swelled by 38 per cent.

Uno Home Loans founder and chief innovation officer Vincent Turner felt the pull of trendy Surry Hills when he returned to Australia to build his online mortgage broker start-up company in 2016 after several years working in San Francisco.

"For me, it's the creative thing," said Mr Turner. "Creative types want cafes and restaurants and pokey streets and art.

"Sydney has proven to be a really good place for early stage financial services, there's just a really thriving ecosystem."

Mr Turner said a major factor in his decision to return to Sydney was the presence of the big banks, which he said had been lacking in United States cities dominated by tech start-ups.

"It became clear that Australia, and specifically Sydney, was a better place to be as an early stage FinTech (financial technology) company.

"If you want to disrupt an industry, you actually have to disrupt from within. It's hard to innovate in a bubble."

Lord mayor Clover Moore said: “The results show that the City of Sydney is the epicentre of jobs and growth in Australia. By creating a city where people come first, we've seen that jobs and new businesses also follow”.

She said the council had worked to boost the city's economy "by adding vitality and interest to the areas just outside the city centre".

“Attracting new businesses and jobs doesn't happen by accident – it takes careful planning and investment.

The survey also showed the number of food and drink businesses, which does not include bars and clubs, had risen 14 per cent. But the number of workers in the city's food and drink businesses dropped 5 per cent.

The council has attributed that change to the rise in part-time workers, the levelling of the market after swift industry growth several years ago, high rents and difficulties in attracting employees.