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An increasing number of academic institutions offer their staff the option to work fromother places than the conventional office, i.e., telework. Academic teaching and research staff arerecognized as some of the most frequent teleworkers, and this seems to affect their well-being, workperformance, and recovery in different ways. This study aimed to investigate academics’ experiencesand perceptions of telework within the academic context. For this, we interviewed 26 academics fromdifferent Swedish universities. Interviews were analyzed with a phenomenographic approach, whichshowed that telework was perceived as a natural part of academic work and a necessary resourcefor coping with, and recovering from, high work demands. Telework was mostly self-regulatedbut the opportunity could be determined by work tasks, professional culture, and management.Telework could facilitate the individual’s work but could contribute to challenges for the workgroup.Formal regulations of telework were considered a threat to academics’ work autonomy and totheir possibility to cope with the high work demands. The findings provide insight into academics’working conditions during teleworking, which may be important for maintaining a sustainable workenvironment when academic institutions offer telework options.