Clockify Review: Is It the Right Time Tracking Software for You?
Clockify is a free time tracking software that offers a simple-to-use timer and time sheet, along with online tools for managing billable and nonbillable hours, tracking team activities, and improving productivity. While you can use its time tracker for free, additional features like client invoicing, time sheet approvals, project templates, and customization options cost extra.
What We Like
- Simple and intuitive interface
- Free tier comes with web, desktop, and mobile time tracking apps
- Supports unlimited users and projects
What's Missing
- Invoicing and labor cost versus budget comparisons cost extra
- Limited report customizability; you can create and add new data fields
- Mobile app is glitchy; software lags from time to time
Deciding Factors
- Per-employee pricing
- Has a free plan with simple time-tracking features
- Pomodoro timer
What We Recommend Clockify For
Clockify earned the top spot on our list of best time tracking software. It’s the only software that we reviewed that offers free time tracking of unlimited projects for an unlimited number of users. Its intuitive interface, ease of use, and efficient time trackers contributed to its high marks.
In short, Clockify is best for:
- Freelance teams that are scaling and need to better manage productivity: Clockify has numerous productivity tools to help ensure that your team is on task. Some unique features include automatic screenshots of the computer screen every five minutes the timer is active, idle detection, and a website tracker that documents how much time each person is spending on different sites.
- Freelancers who have weak internet connections: As long as you’re using a computer or mobile device, Clockify allows you to continue tracking your time even if you lose internet connection. When the connection is restored, all of the time entry data it collected will automatically sync to your account.
- Freelancers who need basic time tracking, nothing fancy, at a low cost: It has a free plan with a basic unlimited time tracking tool—no extras like administrator controls that you don’t need as a sole freelancer. It also has basic detailed reports, API (application programming interface), integration with 50+ third-party software, and unlimited users and projects—these are usually included in the higher tiers of similar software.
When Clockify Would Not Be a Good Fit
Having to pay for basic tools like invoicing and the lack of online time clocks brought Clockify’s ranking down. If those are important for you, check out our other options for the best free time tracking software for small businesses.
Additionally:
- If you need to track actual work hours of hourly staff, then note that Clockify’s time tracker is essentially a stopwatch. It lacks the functionalities to efficiently monitor employee attendance, paid time off (PTO), breaks, and overtime while helping to prevent buddy punching and keeping you compliant with labor regulations. We recommend Homebase if you want online time clocks that support PIN code clock-ins/outs. You can even use its time tracking, scheduling, and basic hiring solutions for free—provided you have only one business location.
- If you want a time tracking solution with free invoicing tools, then consider Harvest. While its free tier comes with only one user seat and two active projects, it’s still a good option for those who are building their client base and have a small number of projects to handle. Note that with Clockify, you have to purchase its Standard plan to get client billing functionalities.
Looking for something different? Read our guide to the best time and attendance software for small businesses to find a solution that’s right for your business.
Clockify Top Alternatives At a Glance
Best for | Restaurants and retail shops with one location wanting free time tracking and scheduling software | Freelancers and solopreneurs looking for time tracking and invoicing tools | QuickBooks users wanting to track billable hours and employee attendance of hourly staff |
Monthly fees from | $24.95 per location but has free plan | $12 per user | $20 plus $8 per employee |
Clockify Pricing
Clockify has a free plan and five paid tiers with monthly fees that start at $4.99 per user ($3.99 if billed annually). The paid packages are designed to enhance its base platform by unlocking other features like invoicing, time sheet approvals, GPS tracking, time audits, custom exports, and single sign-on (SSO) capabilities.
Plans* | Pricing ($/Month) | Best For | Standout Features |
---|---|---|---|
Free | $0 | Those looking for a simple tracker | Time tracker apps that work on computers, web browsers, and mobile iOS/Android devices |
Basic | $4.99 per user ($3.99 per user if billed annually) | Users who want basic administrator controls | Time audits, customized exports, and the capability to add time for one or multiple users |
Standard | $6.99 per user ($5.49 per user if billed annually) | Those who need time sheet and billing features | Time sheet approvals, invoicing, and QuickBooks integration |
Pro | $9.99 per user ($7.99 per user if billed annually) | Organizations looking for robust features to track productivity and profit | GPS tracking, timer screenshots, labor cost and profit summaries, and budget vs actuals reporting |
Enterprise | $14.99 per user ($11.99 per user if billed annually) | Businesses that require strong system security and account management | SSO, user account management, and a custom subdomain |
Server | Contact Clockify | Companies that prefer a self-hosted option | Quick installation and simple maintenance using Docker; phone and priority email support |
*The paid packages include all the features of its Free option. Further, if you subscribe to a higher tier, you automatically get all the tools of the lower options. For example, Standard will have all of Basic’s features, and the Pro option will have all of Standard’s tools. |
Want to know which Clockify plan will fit your budget? Use our online calculator to compute the estimated monthly and annual fees.
Free Plan
This plan is free forever and provides you with all the basic tools you need to track hours on projects. In addition to Clockify’s online time tracker and time sheet, it comes with detailed reports, API access, and customer support (email, chat, and phone). You are also provided integration options with over 50 third-party software, except QuickBooks, since this is included in the Standard tier.
Basic Plan
If you need basic administrator controls, then consider subscribing to this tier. With an administrator account, you can fill in time for others and prevent regular users from submitting timesheets with incomplete information. Aside from creating project templates, you can conduct time audits that allow you to filter out suspicious time entries. With its custom exports, you can even build personalized reports by adding your company logo, selecting data columns that you only need, and exporting these either as PDF, CSV, or Microsoft Excel documents.
Standard Plan
Standard has all of Basic’s features, plus additional tools like client invoicing, time rounding, time sheet approvals, QuickBooks integration, and locked time sheets to prevent regular users from adding or editing past time. You can define the hourly rates on tasks and select which ones are billable. Clockify will also send you automatic reminders via email whenever your staff forgets to log hours or tracks time too much.
Pro Plan
In addition to Standard’s tools, this option has geolocation tracking, scheduled custom reports, labor cost and profit comparisons, and budget versus actual reporting. You also get automated email alerts whenever a project is nearing its deadline or is overdue. If you need to provide detailed work updates to clients, you can use Clockify’s screenshot app, as it captures snapshots of your computer every five minutes that its timer is running.
Enterprise Plan
This plan is optimal for those that need strong security and system controls. You get all of Pro’s features plus SSO, user account management, and the option to move your Clockify workspace into a custom subdomain. This also allows new users to join your workspace automatically and prevents your staff from having multiple workspaces.
Server Plan
Ideal for businesses with strict security and privacy policies, this tier enables you to host Clockify on your own server. Quick installation and simple maintenance are made possible through Docker, and you can choose when to install system updates. You also get all of Clockify’s time tracking and reporting capabilities, plus you can manage and control user accounts from an administrator panel. If you need assistance, Clockify offers phone and priority email support with a response time of 24 hours from having received your inquiry.
Clockify Features
While one of Clockify’s advantages is its free time tracking of unlimited projects for unlimited users, it also has a suite of solutions that can help make handling billing, project management, and employee management easier for users. Let’s take a look at some of Clockify’s essential features.
Time Tracking
Clockify offers time tracking apps for desktop computers (Mac, Windows, and Linux), mobile devices (iOS and Android), and web browsers. It also has browser extensions for Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, and Mozilla Firefox.
Even if you lose internet connection, you can continue to track employee hours—provided you’re using its time tracker for computers and mobile devices. When that happens, Clockify will save all of your time entries on your device and then automatically sync the data to your account once the internet connection has been restored.
With Clockify, you have two ways of capturing hours on projects. One is by using its time tracker and another is by manually logging hours through its time sheet.
Time tracker: Using the time tracker is very easy since it’s basically a stopwatch with start/stop buttons for recording time. Before you can activate the timer, you have to type in the task and project that you’re working on. Clockify will also ask you to input the client name and add a tag. The tag is optional but can be useful for filtering reports and task types.
Time sheet: If you’re handling only one or two projects and are used to doing things manually, then Clockify’s time sheet is the right tool for you. Similar to the time tracker, you need to add the project or task name and then input the number of actual hours on a daily basis. Clockify will automatically summarize the time entries to provide you a bird’s eye view of the number of hours you worked for the week and for a specific task.
You can even add time entries for other users by clicking the “Teammates” button on the upper left of the screen and selecting the employee’s name. However, this option is available only for those who subscribe to Clockify’s Basic plan or higher.
With Clockify’s web app, you can start the timer by clicking the clock icon located at the upper right corner of the screen.
Aside from creating and copying time sheets, Clockify lets you build and save templates for easy time logging.
Project Management
Clockify allows you to monitor not only the time spent on each project but also its progress. You can even break projects down by task, categorize time by job type, and then track the status of each task. We recommend you subscribe to either its Standard tier, if you want to create custom hourly rates for projects, or its Pro plan, if you need automated alerts when you’re close to meeting the budget, in addition to reports that show estimated work hours or costs versus actual data.
Monitor and manage projects with Clockify.
Team Management
This function lets you invite your team members so that they, too, can log their time and track their activities on Clockify. You can invite as many users as you want and need for free. However, if you want to manage access and give permissions to users, you have to upgrade to at least a Standard plan.
Invoicing
The tracked hours that you identified as billable in Clockify can be imported into its invoicing tool. Simply choose the projects for clients that you wish to bill, including the applicable date period, and then generate the invoice. However, if you prefer to do things manually, you can create invoices directly in Clockify by typing in all the details, such as project name, total hours, the unit price per hour, and the billing description.
Invoices that are created or generated in Clockify can be downloaded as PDF documents that you can email to clients. You can even manage invoices by marking them as “Sent,” “Unsent,” “Void,” and “Paid.” Clockify also lets you edit invoices, provided it hasn’t been marked as “Paid.”
Note that only system administrators have access to Clockify’s invoicing page. You also need to purchase at least its Standard plan in order to use this tool.
Clockify has a filter button that allows you to select invoices marked as “Sent,” “Paid,” and “Unsent.”
Productivity Tools
Clockify offers productivity solutions to help you capture hours on projects with better accuracy and provide you with insights on how you and your staff really spend time.
Timer reminders: You can set up alerts to remind you to start Clockify’s timer. This is helpful especially if you keep forgetting to start its time tracker. If you’re managing a team, Clockify can send daily and weekly emails to remind employees to log their hours or notify them if they logged more time than needed. Managers and administrators also receive email notifications that contain a list of users who forgot to track work hours or have more time than their targets.
GPS tracker: Clockify has GPS capabilities (for its mobile apps only) that allow you to see client sites that field employees visited in a workday.
Screenshot app: If you want to provide detailed work progress updates to clients, you can use Clockify’s screenshot app. It automatically captures and saves snapshots of your computer every five minutes the timer is running.
Idle detection: For users who track time via its desktop apps (Microsoft Windows and Mac) and browser extensions (Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox), Clockify has an idle detection feature that detects if you left the timer running but there are no mouse movements and/or keyboard strokes for a specific time period. While it tags that time as “idle,” the system will ask you what to do with the idle time (whether to discard or keep it) as soon as you become active on the computer again.
Pomodoro timer: If you’re using the Clockify browser extension, you can set up alerts to remind you when it’s time to take short and/or long breaks from work.
Auto tracker: Available only in Clockify’s desktop apps, this tool tracks how much time you spend across websites and programs like Gmail, Slack, Google Chrome, and Microsoft Excel among others. It also creates a time sheet based on your activity.
Enable auto tracking with just a few clicks.
Reporting & Analytics
Its reporting feature provides a visual time breakdown and customizable reports that you can share with others via a link and/or export as PDF, CSV, and Excel files. You can also pull up detailed, weekly, or summary reports that show you what’s been worked on, who’s responsible for what, and how much you can earn.
If you subscribe to Clockify’s Pro plan, you can set up project estimates for both time and costs, and then check your budget versus the actuals. You can even compare your labor costs against the amount you charge clients.
Third-Party Software Integrations
Clockify integrates with over 50 third-party software and web apps. Some of its partner systems include:
- Jira
- Asana
- Trello
- Basecamp
- monday.com
- GitHub
- Wrike
- QuickBooks
- Zendesk
- Toggl
- Salesforce
- Freshdesk
- HubSpot
- Zapier
Clockify Ease of Use
- Intuitive interface
- Easy to learn and use
- Simple setup
- In-app chat
- Email and phone support
- FAQs and video tutorials
- Library of how-to guides
Clockify has a straightforward interface with controls that are intuitive and easy to learn. Setting it up is also a breeze—you simply need to download and install its time tracking app and you can immediately start using its free time tracker.
What’s also great about Clockify is that it has a robust online help center that contains a wide range of articles and video tutorials to help guide you through its system and features. While Clockify’s pricing page has a small section for FAQs, you get a longer list of questions (and answers) via the FAQ link on its help page.
In case you need assistance, Clockify offers phone support and has an in-app chat that isn’t manned by a chatbot. You can also send your queries through email or by completing a “Contact Us” form on its website.
What Users Think About Clockify
Users Like | Users Don’t Like |
---|---|
Free and simple to use; tracks time well | You have to pay extra for basic tools like invoicing |
Robust integration options | Occasional software lags |
Customer support is helpful and responsive | Mobile app not as robust as its web browser version; glitches from time to time |
Users who left Clockify reviews online like that it is free and easy to set up and use and provides them with an efficient way to track billable and nonbillable hours. Others even praised its support team for their excellent service, adding that its customer representatives are helpful, responsive, and knowledgeable.
On the other hand, some reviewers said that while Clockify offers multiple solutions to help them track time, its mobile app isn’t as robust as its web-based solution. A few users even complained about having experienced mobile app glitches and software lags from time to time.
At the time of publication, Clockify reviews earned the following scores on popular user review sites:
- Capterra: 4.7 out of 5 based on 4,100+ reviews
- G2: 4.5 out of 5 based on 120+ reviews
Bottom Line
For business owners and freelancers who want a budget-friendly solution for tracking time on projects, Clockify is a great option. It has a free tier that doesn’t limit the number of projects you can track or the user seats that you can have. It also has an intuitive interface with options that allow you to capture hours spent working on projects either automatically or manually.
While many of its features—like invoicing, productivity reports, and time sheet approvals—are paid add-ons, Clockify’s pricing for these tools is still reasonable, with monthly fees that start at $4.99 per user. Get started with a free Clockify account, or explore its paid plans with a seven-day free trial. Sign up to try it today.