Best 8 Time Tracking Software for Small Businesses 2020

The best time tracking software for your business will depend on whether you are looking to ensure accurate payroll for hourly employees to assign accurate labor costs to jobs or both. We’ve narrowed down your choices to eight great software options that also come with quality time tracking apps.

• TSheets: Best overall time tracking software for small businesses to track billable hours and manage their hourly workforce
• Harvest: Best for service companies with one to five employees to track time and generate invoices from the field
• ClockShark: Best for construction companies to prevent employee time theft and track project completion
• TimeTracker: Best for accounting and law firms to track billable hours realization
• FreshBooks: Best for freelancers or self-employed workers to track hours and bill clients
• QuickBooks Online: Best for QuickBooks Online users to remotely collect hours from employees for no additional fee
• Zoho People: Best for tracking employees with GPS and biometric identification to prevent time theft
• Clockify: Best free software to track billable hours by project

How to Choose the Best Time Tracking Software

If you are looking for time tracking software to help you manage hourly employees working outside the office, you should consider the following features:

• Clock in and out: Your hourly employees should have a time tracking app that allows them to clock in when they arrive to work and clock out when they leave, rather than having employees inputting the total number of hours they worked.
• GPS location: You should be able to see where your employees are when they clock in and out.
• ID verification: Your time tracking app should verify the identity of the person clocking in and out by either taking a picture of the person or using facial recognition.
• No editing: Employees should not be able to edit the time information collected by the app manually. Supervisors or managers should be responsible for changes.
• Payroll: The hours collected by the app should automatically transfer to a payroll system.

Consider the following additional features if you want to use hours information to manage projects and bill the customer.

• Assign time to jobs and service codes: Employees should be able to designate what job and task they are working on when they clock in and out.
• Invoicing: Hours should easily transfer to an invoice so customers can be billed.
• Compare to budget: The time tracking software should either compare actual hours to budget or export hours information to a software that will do so.
• Project management: The time tracking software should export the hours information to software that can calculate overall profit and loss by job.

TSheets: Best Overall Time Tracking Software

TSheets is the best overall time tracking software. It is terrific for both managing your hourly workforce and tracking the costs of jobs. TSheets is owned by QuickBooks, so it’s not surprising that it integrates well with both QuickBooks Online and QuickBooks Desktop, but it also integrates with QuickBooks’ competitors like Xero, Sage, ADP, Gusto, and Square Payroll. You can evaluate TSheets with a 14-day free trial that does not require a credit card.

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TSheets Pricing

• Premium: $20, plus $8/employee, per month
• Elite: $40, plus $10/employee, per month (includes job costing and geofencing)
• Discounts available for 50 or more employees
• Free 14-day trial and 25% off for three months

TSheets Features

• Employee ID: Attach photos to timesheets or use a terminal with facial recognition
• Crew app: Option to clock in and out entire crews at one time
• Who’s working: View a map with the current location of all employees on the clock
• Payroll: Export hours for payroll processing to QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Desktop, Xero, ADP, Gusto, Square Payroll, and others
• Geofencing: App reminds workers to clock in and out as they enter and exit a job site
• Job costing: Track time by job and task and compare to budgeted hours, or export information to bookkeeping software, including QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Desktop, Xero, Sage and others
• Invoices: Invoices can be generated within TSheets, or by your integrated bookkeeping software

Harvest: Best for Tracking Time by Project With 5 or Fewer Employees

Harvest is great for companies with only a few employees because there are no fixed monthly costs, and you pay strictly by the number of employees tracking hours. Harvest allows you to track project hours and bill customers for hours tracked but doesn’t help process the payroll for your hourly employees. No credit card is required to start your 30-day free trial.

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Harvest Pricing

• Free: One person tracking up to two projects
• Pro: $12 per person per month for unlimited projects

Harvest Features

• Timer: Users can input hours by day or week or use the built-in timer to calculate hours
• Project management: Hours can be assigned to customers and projects
• Budgeted hours: Hours for in-process jobs can compare to budgeted hours
• Invoices: Create and email invoices for hours tracked
• Bookkeeping integrations: Transfer invoices generated and payments received to QuickBooks Online or Xero but hours tracked do not transfer

ClockShark: Best for Construction Companies

Time theft is a serious concern for construction companies with workers that spend all day in remote locations. ClockShark can help you rest easy with facial recognition, GPS tracking, geofence notifications, and pictures to show the progress of the job. ClockShark tracks hours by job and service code to be exported to popular payroll and accounting programs. You can evaluate ClockShark with a 14-day free trial.

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ClockShark Pricing

ClockShark comes in three plans, but you’ll probably want the Standard plan to be able to use the GPS and geofencing features.

• Basic: $15, plus $3 per person, per month
• Standard: $25, plus $6 per person, per month (includes advanced GPS tracking)
• Pro: $45, plus $8 per person. per month (includes advanced job cost controls)

ClockShark Features

• Kiosk: Set up a tablet or smartphone to work as a time-clock kiosk with facial recognition for an entire crew, or allow workers to clock-in on their own mobile device
• CrewClock: Supervisors can clock-in and out entire crews or specific workers
• GPS tracking: See the location of everyone clocked-in and replay their routes for the day
• Geofencing: Reminds workers to clock in and out when they arrive and leave the job site; notifies you when a worker is on the clock while away from the job site
• Integrations: Hours transfer to QuickBooks, ADP, Zapier, Xero, and Sage for invoicing, project management, and payroll.
• Job costing: Time is tracked by job and service code

TimeTracker: Best for Law Firms or Professional Service Firms

TimeTracker by eBillity is the only time tracking software reviewed that allows you to track billable hours realization or the percentage of billable hours invoiced to a client vs written off. You can use TimeTracker as a stand-alone billing system, or you can transfer information to popular bookkeeping software. You can use the 14-day free trial to evaluate TimeTracker.

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TimeTracker Pricing

Firms will need the Legal subscription to gain access to all the tools discussed here. However, there are some less expensive options if you don’t need billable hours realization reports.

• Basic: $10 per month plus $5 per user, per month (no job costing or invoicing)
• Billing: $20 per month plus $10 per user, per month (no hours realization tracking)
• Legal: $20 per month plus $15 per user, per month

TimeTracker Features

• Collect hours: Employees can use the built-in timer or input hours directly
• Job costing: Assign hours and expenses to jobs
• Invoices: Create legal invoices and collect online payments
• GPS On the Clock: Tracks and documents billable travel time
• Manage costs: Track both employee costs and client billing rates
• Integrations: Information transfers to QuickBooks, Sage, and Xero for bookkeeping and ADP or Gusto for payroll processing

For more information, read our complete TimeTracker review.

FreshBooks: Best for Freelancers Needing Bookkeeping and Hourly Billing

FreshBooks is a great choice for your company if you want to accumulate hours from one or two team members to bill clients but don’t have hourly employees. Because the timer is built directly into the FreshBooks bookkeeping software, it is extremely simple to use. There is no credit card required to start using FreshBooks with a 30-day free trial.

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FreshBooks Pricing

• Lite (up to five billable clients): Per-month price of $15, plus $10 per additional team member
• Plus (up to 50 billable clients): Per-month price of $25, plus $10 per additional team member
• Premium (up to 500 billable clients): Per-month price of $50, plus $10 per additional team member
• Custom pricing for more than 500 billable clients
• 30-day free trial
• FreshBooks is offering 60% off for 6 months on all subscription packages through 4/30/2021

FreshBooks Features

• Timer: Team members can track hours by using a built-in timer or by inputting hours
• Job costing: Hours can be charged to specific clients and projects
• Invoicing: Easily create great-looking invoices for tracked hours
• Monitor team: View your team’s hours by the day, week, or month
• Gusto Payroll: Integrated payroll with Gusto is available for an additional fee, but the hours tracked in FreshBooks doesn’t transfer to Gusto.

For more information, read our complete FreshBooks review.

QuickBooks Online: Best for Tracking an Unlimited Number of Employees

QuickBooks Online, our top pick for small business accounting software, has a built-in mobile time-tracking system that can be activated for no charge. The built-in time tracker works great for accumulating hours by job for costing purposes, but it doesn’t have any features that will help you manage your hourly workforce. For features like a time clock, GPS locating, and employee identification, you’ll need the TSheets integration.

If you don’t already subscribe to QuickBooks Online, you can get started with your choice of a 30-day free trial or 70% off for three months.

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QuickBooks Online Pricing

The time track feature is included with all QuickBooks Online subscriptions (except Simple Start) and includes an unlimited number of time-tracking users:

• Essentials: $40 per month
• Plus: $70 per month (includes tracking project profitability)
• Advanced: $150 per month (includes advanced reporting)
• Free 30-day trial or 70% for three months

QuickBooks Online Time Tracking Features

• Mobile entry: Users log in to QuickBooks Online’s mobile website and input hours worked by job and service code.
• Payroll: Hours entered transfer into payroll feature
• Invoicing: Create invoices to bill hours tracked to customers
• Project tracking: View hours and costs assigned to jobs to analyze job profitability
• Reports: View recent time activity and time activity by employees

Zoho People: Best for Low-cost GPS Tracking

Zoho People tracks the hours of your employees by job and service code and can transfer the hours to invoices and project management. Zoho People works well for both office and field employees with built-in GPS tracking. Combined with a huge array of integrated Zoho apps, Zoho People provides a comprehensive business management system. You can purchase the entire collection of Zoho apps or purchase only what you need. There is no credit card required to evaluate the software with their 15-day free trial.

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Zoho People Price

• Starts at $1.66 per user, per month (billed annually), for a plan that includes time tracking, geolocation tracking, and biometric integration.

Zoho People Features

• Time tracker: Employees can use the time clock or log their hours directly while assigning them to customers and tasks
• Geofencing: Remind employees to clock in or out when they enter or leave defined locations
• Biometric attendance management: Integrate your biometric device to confirm the identity of the employee
• Payroll: Payroll processing available only in California and Texas
• Integrated apps: Hours transfer to Zoho Books and Zoho Projects to pay invoice customers and manage projects.
• Comprehensive human resources (HR) features: Manage your employee database, attendance and leave tracking, performance evaluations, and manage employee training schedules

Clockify: Best Free Time Tracking Software

Clockify tracks hours for unlimited projects for an unlimited number of users for free! This is an excellent tool to capture all billable and nonbillable hours worked for your entire team. Clockify will transfer tracked hours to Manager.io, a free bookkeeping software. Since Clockify is free, you can test it before making any commitment.

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Clockify Pricing

The free version will work fine if your goal is to track your team’s hours by project. The pay versions add a few nice controls and features you might find helpful.

• Plus: $9.99 per month for unlimited users
  • Lock prior timesheets from user edits
  • Don’t accept timesheets with missing information
• Premium: $29.99 per month for unlimited users
  • Add time for others, bulk edit, and over-budget alerts

Clockify Features

• Time input: Track using the built-in stopwatch or input hours after the fact
• Projects: Track time by project and task
• Billable: Mark time as billable or nonbillable
• Dashboard: View at a glance your team’s top activities, detail of what they worked on, and what they are currently doing
• Reports: See total and billable hours by date filtered by client, project, or task
• Budgeted hours: Compare actual hours by project to budgeted hours
• Export: Hours can be exported to spreadsheets that can then be imported into numerous bookkeeping, invoicing, or payroll solutions

Bottom Line

The best time tracking software for you depends on whether your goal is producing accurate payroll for hourly workers, capturing billable hours, assigning costs to jobs accurately, or all of the above. We recommend TSheets for most businesses as it meets all three goals and integrates with popular bookkeeping and payroll software like QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Desktop, Xero, ADP, Gusto, and Square Payroll.

Tracking time by hand is time consuming and difficult to monitor. TSheets provides a way for your employees to directly input their own hours, while providing tools to limit the opportunities for employee time theft. TSheets is currently offering 25% off for three months. You can start with a 14-day free trial that doesn’t require a credit card.

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