A systematic review and meta-synthesis of the barriers of offsite construction projects

Offsite construction (OSC) has been increasingly adopted in the construction industry, especially with increased practical interest in digital transformation in construction, automated production, assembly, and delivery. The uptake of OSC has not however been consistent internationally, and the adoption rate of modular and prefabricated construction is still poor in many developing and developed countries. This review aims to detect and classify the barriers for adopting OSC by assimilating previous research studies. This paper systematically analyses 75 research articles, published in the past decade spanning between 2012 and 2022 inclusive. A total of 47 barriers were identified through this review and the five most frequent barriers were: lack of skills and expertise in OSC within the organization, poor cooperation and integration between stakeholders in the value chain, higher project costs, higher capital cost, and lack of a national standards and design codes for prefabricated components. The analysis offers insights into gaps that exist that could support greater OSC activity globally. Barrier trends by publication year and country are reported to highlight changes in research activity to delineate recommendations for future work to ensure greater uptake.