A time tracking app should act as a tool to simplify your work. Learn about the best time tracking apps and timesheet software of 2022...
Searching for best time tracking apps or timesheet software? Time tracking is a word that can make every employee squirm when they hear it for the first time. A common argument against time tracking is that they are intrusive and add to the existing workload. One of the reasons why time tracking may seem like a tedious task is because of the medium used to track hours. This can be easily managed with good time tracking software.
So then, what are the best time tracking apps available in the market today and how do you choose the right one for your business? If you remember, we had already discussed the importance of time management in our blog on time management strategies. In this article, we have tried to address the following questions that we come across frequently regarding time tracking apps.
Why do you need time tracking apps?
Time tracking should not be done to keep a tab on how and where your employees spend every second of their time at work. Instead, a time tracking app should act as a scale to measure project progress and productivity, and as a tool to simplify your work.
Time tracking apps can give you detailed insights about the productive and non-productive time spent on different tasks. You can also use the data from your previous projects to estimate the time required to complete similar projects in the future. Some time tracking apps even support invoicing and lets you view billable hours. This means you can integrate it with your accounting system for seamless payroll processing.
Whether you are a freelancer, a small team or a large enterprise, a time tracking app can be of immense help to anyone looking to complete their projects on time and budget.
In the next section, we will be covering the top time tracking apps (in no particular order or preference), their features, benefits, and pricing plans. While a few of these were developed for the sole purpose of tracking hours, some of the best time trackers also provide other functionalities along with time tracking. It is recommended that you visit their respective websites for updated plans and pricing.
Time Tracker- Harvest
With Harvest, you can track time to specific clients, projects, and tasks. The tool lets you record these hours in a weekly timesheet, all at once. If you need to track your project progress, Harvest lets you do that easily too. For example, you can use it to compare capacity to actual tracked time, see how much time is tracked to a project, and how close you are to your budget.
The solution even allows you to view billable hours, project budget, billable amount, and overall costs. In addition, it can automatically export billable time and expenses and can be integrated with accounting software like QuickBooks Online or Xero.
Time Tracking, Expenses Management, Invoicing, Project Management
Perfect for those looking for a simple project management tool. Harvest also offers a wide range of integrations to choose from and if you need to connect it to a tool that is not supported, you can make your own custom Harvest integrations using Zapier.
Offers 3 plans which include a free plan for sole users with limited features. The premium plans are- a solo plan for 1 user at $12/month and a team plan for more than 2 users at $12/user/month.
Taimer makes time tracking easy and effortless with the advanced automatic built-in time tracker. It has a start and stop timer and also has a drag-and-drop functionality to assign hours to tasks and projects. Time tracking is just one of the many project management features that Taimer offers. You can use Taimer boards to collaborate with teams and clients and schedule resources using the Resource Gantt.
The integrated project management software can help you monitor project progress, milestones, and project budget in real-time. Apart from these, you can target costs, track leads, manage quotes and even get sales forecasts. Above all, you can use Taimer's advanced mobile apps to manage your sales activities and collaborate on projects from anywhere, at any time.
Sales CRM, Leads & Deals, Projects, Resource Gantt, Invoices, Time Tracking, Expenses, Sales Quotes, CPQ
With Taimer, you can replace more than 10+ apps with just one platform. If you are a small or midsize enterprise looking for an affordable time-tracking and business management solution, then Taimer is the best bet for you.
There are 4 solutions that are customized for sole traders, sales teams, project owners, small businesses, and large enterprises. Taimer's solutions come with 14 days of free trials to explore the solutions.
With Toggl, you can start a new time entry or continue tracking previous tasks in just a click. The system reminds you when you're not tracking your time and can be integrated with your favorite online apps.
Toggl is also a good productivity-tracking tool. The project dashboard gives project progress estimates based on the time spent on different tasks and lets you assign billable rates to your tasks. Most importantly, Toggle alerts you when your projects go over their estimated time.
Time Tracking, Productivity Tool
If you’re looking for a simple-to-use, no-frills time tracker, then Toggl can help you manage your tasks and activities.
Offers 4 plans and includes a basic free plan for teams up to 5 users. The starter plan is at $9 per user/month. The premium plan is for $18 per user/month and they have custom pricing for the ERP solution.
Timely's time tracker improves timesheet accuracy with automatic time tracking. It takes your recorded work, groups them together, and suggests time entries for the future. Timely also helps you monitor your project performance by breaking it down into tasks and also tracks important milestones and employee hours spent on these tasks.
The system monitors team performance against key metrics like billable and non-billable work hours and capacity. You can see what individual members of your team are working on, in real-time and create and share detailed timesheets and reports for each team member in a few clicks.
Project Time Management, Time Tracking, Team Time Management
The tool has a simple interface and is easy to navigate with a unique AI system that can be trained to suggest time entries for the future.
They have 3 separate packages each, for both teams and individuals. The plan for teams start at $89 per month and the individual plans are priced at $6, $12, $20 per month.
TIP: Here is a free eGuide on 6 Time Management strategies that can help every business to stay on time and budget.
You can toggle between multiple timers at a time in the Tick platform. Once your time is entered, you can add notes and generate customized reports. Tick tracks your time against your budgets and helps you remain profitable. You can see a breakdown of the hours tracked by task and people, set a budget for individual or smaller tasks and set recurring projects.
Tick offers a straightforward time card where you can create a time entry in just a few clicks. It claims to turn a time management software into a streamlined communication tool.
Project Budget Tracking, Time Tracking, Time Reporting
The system provides you with budget updates and reports whenever you log a time entry. These reports tell you which projects are the most profitable, the time allotted for a project, time billed and the time remaining for a project.
They offer pricing plans which are not limited by users but depends on the number of projects you take up. It includes a free plan capped at 1 project for unlimited users. The premium plans start at $19/month for up to 10 projects.
Time Tracker- Clockify
Clockify lets you track time with a start and stop timer and can monitor progress and budget. Known for its simple interface, this time tracking software helps you to track productivity, attendance, and billable hours. For instance, you can invite your team to record their attendance and see where they spend time and what your team is working on.
Time Tracking, Timesheet management
If you’re looking for a free time tracking app with basic time tracking functionalities then Clockify would be a good option.
The cloud-version of Clockify is free for everyone irrespective of the number of users or projects.
Time Tracker- Freshbooks
Tracking time with the Freshbooks Chrome timer is simple and easy. You can get a complete overview of how your entire team is spending their time. The timer can record time against a specific client and can automatically bill for tracked hours.
Primarily an accounting software, it’s easy to create professional-looking invoices and put your invoicing on auto-pilot with this tool. At the same time, you can manage your expenses and reimbursements in the same tool. FreshBooks accounting tools help you make business decisions based on actual business data and insights.
Invoices, Expenses, Accounts, Projects, Time Tracking, Payments
If you are self-employed or a growing business looking for accounting software with time tracking functionalities, FreshBooks offers great invoicing and accounting solutions.
FreshBooks has 4 plans which vary based on the total number of billable clients. There are no free plans but they offer a free trial on all plans. The plans start at $15 per 5 billable clients, per month.
Hubstaff has an easy-to-use interface and provides great timesheet management functionalities. For example, it supports both manual and automatic time tracking, you can track time and generate timesheets, record employee hours, and view online reports to optimize company performance.
You can easily plan shifts and track employee attendance and use GPS-based time tracking to record time on the road and at work sites. The tool can also automatically generate invoices that can be sent to clients.
Payroll, Employee Scheduling, Time Tracking, Project Budgeting, GPS Tracking
Hubstaff's employee productivity tracker offers a simple way to measure employee productivity. If your main goal is to monitor employee performance and the team’s workload, this would be a good tool to explore.
Offers 4 plans which include a free plan for a sole user. The monthly premium plans include a Basic plan at $5/month, a Premium plan at $10/month, and Enterprise at $20/month.
Scoro has a simple time-tracking tool and also lets you manage project tasks, meetings, invoices, expenses, and billable and non-billable hours. This means you can easily schedule work and assign tasks to resources, create a project budget and monitor budget utilization, keep track of purchases and costs, and even send invoices.
It has a customizable CRM from which you can access all your contacts and accounts. You can visualize your entire sales pipeline and manage sales activities using their sales pipeline management system. Apart from this, you can get detailed financial reports and other business metrics.
Project Management, Time Tracking, Work Scheduling, CRM, Quotes, Financial Management
If you are looking for an advanced business management solution to manage all stages of your projects including time tracking, Scoro is a good tool to explore.
They offer a tiered subscription service with 4 premium plans. The essential plan is at €18/user/month and the other plans start at €29/user/month.
With Paymo, you can track time spent on different tasks and activities and see how much time you spend on each task or project and share these reports with clients.
It lets you manage your tasks using Kanban Boards and helps you create accurate plans and schedules. You can get a bird’s eye view of resource utilization and manage leaves using a leave planner. The tool can create invoices can even record and keep track of the expenses you incur.
Task Management, Time Tracking, Resource Scheduling, Invoicing
Offers a full set of project management tools to help you manage your projects whether you’re a freelancer or a team manager.
They have 3 project management solutions which include a free plan for freelancers. The customized plan for growing teams is available for $9.56/user/month and a Business plan designed for large teams is priced at $15.16/user/month.
Time Tracking, Attendance Management, Invoicing, Expenses
With eBillity, you can allocate hours and expenses to a customer and to a project effortlessly. You can keep track of your team's time, analyze billable hours, and easily invoice hours.
They offer three separate plans. The time tracker plan starts at $4 per user per month and the invoicing plans including the time tracker starts at $8 per user per month.
With Zoho, you can set up a recurring billing profile, automate payment reminders, and get paid on time. It shows which customer is slow to pay and which invoices have already been paid.
Top Features
CRM, Sales, Projects, Time Tracking, Accounting, Invoicing, Finances Management, Collaboration, HR
If you are a medium to large-sized enterprise looking for accounting software to manage your invoices and expenses primarily, then Zoho offers advanced accounting features along with time tracking for reasonable pricing.
Offers 4 plans and includes a free plan for sole-users which is capped at 5 invoices per month. The Basic plan lets you invoice up to 50 customers and is priced at $9 per month and the Professional plan priced at $29 per organization per month allows you to invoice unlimited customers.
With Xero, you can keep track of your cash flow by sending invoices with online payment options. You can track inventory, manage stocks and add items to invoices and orders. It can also automatically and securely import your bank transactions every business day.
Top Features
Payments, Banking, Inventory Management, Invoicing, Project Management, POs, Time Tracking
If you're looking to get a full up-to-date picture of how your business is performing and do not mind shelling out a few extra dollars, then Xero offers three comprehensive business solutions which include a time tracking software.
Does not include free plans but offers 3 business solutions priced at $20/month for limited invoices and $30/month and $40/month for unlimited invoices and other additional functionalities.
With Nutcache, you can track project progress, approve your team's timesheets, and forecast project delivery. This time-tracking tool can help you visualize project advancement and monitor the actual task completion time, as a result, you can identify potential delays.
Nutcache makes collaboration simple and easy. For example, you can assign team members to your project, and share notes & documents in real time. This lets you stay on top of urgent tasks and stay aligned with project objectives.
Time Tracking, Project Management, Collaboration
This is an all-in-one agile project management solution. If you are a project manager, it can also help manage sprints with its unique scrum framework.
They offer three project management plans - for sole users at $8.95 per month, teams at $6 per user/month, and enterprises at $12 per user/month.
The market is flooded with time-tracking tools and software, however, it is important to choose one based on your business size, budget, and goals.
If you are looking to save time and money, pick a multi-functional tool. You don't have to keep switching between different systems or have to pay for multiple apps as your business scales. A standalone app or manual time-tracking systems like spreadsheets wouldn't be the best option if you're managing multiple projects, tracking hourly rates, or managing remote teams.
Here is a concise summary of the top time trackers discussed above. Most of these desktop apps are available on both iOS and Android apps.
| Time Tracker | Main features | Free Plans | Pricing |
| Harvest | Time Tracking, Expenses Management, Invoicing, Project Management | Yes | View Pricing |
| Heeros | Sales CRM, Leads & Deals, Projects, Resource Gantt, Invoices, Time Tracking, Expenses, Sales Quotes, CPQ | Trial | View Pricing |
| Toggl | Time Tracking, Productivity Tool | Yes | View Pricing |
| Timely | Project Time Management, Time Tracking, Team Time Management | No | View Pricing |
| Tick | Project Budget Tracking, Time Tracking, Time Reporting | Yes | View Pricing |
| Clockify | Time Tracking, Timesheet management | Yes | View Pricing |
| FreshBooks | Invoices, Expenses, Accounts, Projects, Time Tracking Payments | No | View Pricing |
| HubStaff | Payroll, Employee Scheduling, Time Tracking, Project Budgeting, GPS Tracking | Yes | View Pricing |
| Scoro | Project Management, Time Tracking, Work Scheduling, CRM, Quotes, Financial Management | No | View Pricing |
| Paymo | Task Management, Time Tracking, Resource Scheduling, Invoicing | Yes | View Pricing |
| eBillity | Time Tracking, Attendance Management, Invoicing, Expenses | No | View Pricing |
| Zoho | CRM, Sales, Projects, Time Tracking, Accounting, Invoicing, Finances Management, Collaboration, HR | Yes | View Pricing |
| Xero | Payments, Banking, Inventory Management, Invoicing, Project Management, POs, Time Tracking | No | View Pricing |
| Nutcache | Time Tracking, Project Management, Collaboration | No | View Pricing |
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Never underestimate the importance of time tracking. Properly implemented it will increase productivity and make day-to-day life much easier.
Time management tools are every project managers secret weapon. Learn more about 6 effective time management strategies and the top 4 time tracking...
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