The best free time tracking software not only monitor hours worked from multiple platforms but also allow GPS tracking and geofencing, PTO tracking, break options, and overtime or early clock-in/out alerts. Some even have productivity and invoicing tools, enabling users to view idle/inactive times and to bill clients easily.
In this article, we evaluated 14 providers and narrowed the list down to our seven top recommendations:
- Clockify: Best overall free time tracking software
- Hubstaff: Best for companies in need of robust time and task tracking to monitor productivity of employees who aren’t working in the office
- Jibble: Ideal for businesses with field workers that need mobile and biometric attendance kiosks with affordable upgrades
- TimeCamp: Best for freelancers and remote employees who require strong work productivity and client invoicing tools
- TMetric: Best for small startups with five or fewer users and freelancers that need strong invoicing tools
- AccountSight: Best for accounting and law firms in need of strong expense recording and billing tools
- Timesheet: Ideal for construction companies that require an automated time tracker with WLAN and geofencing features
Need time tracking and employee scheduling options? You’ll find better options in our best time and attendance software guide.
How We Evaluated the Best Free Time Tracking Software
Initially, we evaluated 14 free time tracking software and then narrowed our list to the best seven. We compared each product’s pricing and ease of use. We also looked for essential features like secure clock-ins/outs, geolocation tracking, invoicing, pre-built reports, mobile apps, and the ability to allocate hours to jobs. We even considered the provider’s integration options with third-party software like payroll and project management solutions.
Based on our evaluation, Clockify is the best overall free time tracking software. It earned an overall score of 4.58 out of 5 with high marks for pricing, ease of use, popularity, and billing, labor costing, and reporting capabilities. Clockify’s free version also supports unlimited users and projects, which is great for budget-conscious employers.
Are you a freelancer or have a freelance team? Check out our best time tracking software for freelancers and self-employed workers.
To see our full evaluation criteria for the best free time tracking software, click through the tabs in the box below.
20% of Overall Score
We selected providers with a free plan and transparent pricing for its paid tiers. Extra points were given to providers with paid subscriptions that are priced at $10 or less per employee monthly. Among the shortlisted free time tracking solutions we evaluated, Jibble has the most affordable plans to upgrade the free version. Hubstaff, on the other hand, is the most expensive since you need a minimum of two users to purchase any of its upgrade options.
20% of Overall Score
We evaluated each free time tracking software based on its accessibility using multiple devices and platforms. Access to mobile apps and a self-service portal is also ideal. Plus points were given to those with digital time sheets that can be exported, geofencing and GPS tracking features, break options, and PTO tracking, including administrator alerts (overtime, early clock-in/out). When it comes to time tracking functionalities, Hubstaff topped our list with a 5 out of 5, which can be attributed to the PTO and leave monitoring and GPS and geofencing tracking features that it has.
20% of Overall Score
We awarded more points to free time tracking solutions that allow users to allocate hours by job code, compare budget versus actual hours, and generate invoices to bill clients. Additional points were also given to those who can export time data to software to calculate profit and loss by jobs for easy project management. All the free time tracking tools that we evaluated earned 5 out of 5 stars for their project management and invoicing capabilities that proved useful.
20% of Overall Score
We gave high scores to free time tracking providers that real users find intuitive and easy to learn and implement. We also considered solutions with quick response turnaround via live phone support, training, system implementations, and multiple third-party integration options with payroll, accounting, and scheduling systems in particular. Additional points were awarded if the software has an offline mode. Among the seven shortlisted free time tracking software, only Timesheet and TimeCamp earned low scores because both lack offline tracking mode and live phone support.
10% of Overall Score
Aside from having access to standard and pre-built reports, users should be able to create their own reports and view information within their organization. All free time tracking solutions were able to garner 5 out of 5 for this particular criteria since all of them have pre-built and customizable reports that clients were able to fully utilize.
10% of Overall Score
For this criteria, solutions with an average score of 4+ stars from online user reviews on sites like Capterra and G2 get high marks. Plus points were given if the software has 1,000 or more reviews on third-party sites. Among the seven free time tracking providers, Clockify is very popular with users, garnering 5 out of 5 stars in our evaluation.
Clockify
PROS
- User-friendly with an intuitive interface
- Free tier comes with web, desktop, and mobile time tracking apps
- Offline mode using the mobile app
- Free version supports unlimited users and projects
CONS
- GPS tracking is available only for premium plans
- PTO policies and tracking are not yet available
- Invoicing and labor cost versus budget comparisons cost extra
| RATING CRITERIA | Pricing | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 |
| Employee Time Tracking Functionality | 3.50 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Billable Hours & Job Labor Costing Functions | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Popularity | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Reporting | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Ease of Use | 4.38 | OUT OF | 5 |
Clockify is an affordable, full-featured time tracking software. Its free version is good for employers and freelancers on a tight budget since users get an unlimited number of seats and projects. Aside from basic time tracking, you get unlimited detailed reports, API access, multiple customer support options (email, chat, and phone), and over 50 third-party software integrations.
Clockify earned an overall score of 4.58 out of 5 in our evaluation. It received stellar marks on pricing, billable hours and job labor costing, reporting features, and popularity. It did not do so well on employee time tracking functionality; it handles basic time tracking but cannot officially monitor paid-time-off (PTO) and overtime, features employers typically need more than freelancers. Users find it easy to use but find its reporting features limited.
If you want to understand its time tracking functionalities that can improve your workforce’s productivity, read our Clockify review.
Clockify Pricing
- Free: Clockify’s free plan supports unlimited users and projects. In addition to online timers and time sheets, it includes project and task tracking, reporting tools, and a calendar where you can view tasks and add/edit time blocks.
Optional Upgrades:
- Basic: For $4.99 per user, per month, you get everything in the free plan and administration tools that include project templates, time audits, and the capability to add time for one or multiple users.
- Standard: At $6.99 per user monthly, you get all of Basic’s features plus timesheet and attendance tools (time sheet approvals and time-off requests), billing and invoicing features, and QuickBooks integration.
- Pro: For $9.99 per user monthly, aside from all Standard features this plan offers productivity and profit tools, scheduled reports, GPS tracking, and automatic email alerts when a project hits its allocated budget.
- Enterprise: Priced at $14.99 per user, per month, this plan comes with premium control and security solutions like account management, single sign-on (SSO), and a custom subdomain.
- Server: If your company has strict privacy and security policies, this custom-priced plan lets you host Clockify on your own servers.
Clockify Standout Features
- Flexible time tracker: Clockify’s time tracking app is accessible via computers, mobile devices (iOS and Android), and web browsers. It also has browser extensions for Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, and Mozilla Firefox. You can access it offline—just like Hubstaff, Jibble, and TMetric—and will automatically sync the data to your account once the internet connection has been restored.
- GPS tracking: If you have field employees, Clockify’s GPS clocking and location tracking tool, which is similar to that of Hubstaff and Jibble, can help you locate your staff’s whereabouts during a workday. However, you need to upgrade to Clockify’s Pro package if you need geolocation tracking. With this, you can see your onsite field workers’ current or last known locations, current or last clocked-in locations, and all currently visited worksites.
- Productivity tools: Clockify offers timer reminders on a daily and weekly basis through emails to employees, managers, and administrators. It has a screenshot app (to update clients on work progress), idle detection, Pomodoro timer (break time), and auto tracker (time spent on other apps).
- Project management: With Clockify, you can monitor your work hours and progress on every project. You can even break projects down by task, categorize time by job type, and then track the status of each task.
- Invoicing: Unlike AccountSight’s unlimited invoicing for its free version, Clockify only offers this feature in its premium plans. For Standard plan users, billable hours can be imported into its invoicing tool. The invoices that are generated in Clockify can be downloaded as PDF documents that you can email to clients. You can also edit invoices, as long as they haven’t been paid by the client.
- Detailed reporting and analytics: Clockify provides you with 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. With this feature, 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.
- Multiple third-party integrations: Clockify integrates with over 50 third-party software and web apps. Some of its partner systems include Jira, Asana, Basecamp, GitHub, QuickBooks, Zendesk, Zapier, and Freshdesk.
- Custom support: Clockify provides email and phone support, in addition to FAQs, video tutorials, and even a library of how-to guides. You can also connect with the support team through an in-app chat—something only Clockify offers.
Hubstaff
PROS
- Has web, desktop, and mobile apps to accurately track time
- Has user-friendly, customizable user interface
- Has geofencing and GPS trackers
- Create PTO policies and manage time-off requests
CONS
- Advanced features like GPS tracking, PTO, and employee monitoring tools costs extra
- The free version is for one user only
- Occasional app glitches
| RATING CRITERIA | Pricing | 3.75 | OUT OF | 5 |
| Employee Time Tracking Functionality | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Billable Hours & Job Labor Costing Functions | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Popularity | 4.5 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Reporting | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Ease of Use | 4.13 | OUT OF | 5 |
Hubstaff is an all-in-one time tracking and employee monitoring solution that is best for companies with remote or field employees. Its free plan has both time tracking and reporting functionalities, including a simple-to-use online time sheet that allows you to log hours and activities. Its customizable reporting functionality is designed to improve workflows and create better estimates. You can also set a schedule to automatically send reports to yourself, your client, or even stakeholders so that everyone is updated.
In our evaluation, Hubstaff earned an overall score of 4.53 out of 5. It got perfect marks on employee time tracking, billable hours and job labor costing, and reporting. Its employee monitoring tools and geofencing and GPS trackers raised its score, as well. However, it took a hit in pricing since it is more expensive than the other providers (requires a minimum of two users to purchase any of its upgrade options).
In terms of user feedback, several subscribers said that Hubstaff helped them manage remote contractors/employees better. Others, however, complained about occasional app glitches and the inability to communicate with employees directly within the app.
Hubstaff Pricing
Hubstaff has one free option and three paid upgrade plans with scalable tiers: Hubstaff Free Plan ($0), Hubstaff Time ($7 to $20), Hubstaff Desk ($7 to $20), and Hubstaff Field ($15 to $20).
Hubstaff Free: This is a free plan for a single user with limited features. It has time tracking, screenshots, keyboard and mouse activity, employee payments, 24/7 support, per-user settings, and limited data retention.
Hubstaff Time: For simple time tracking and reporting
Plan | Starter | Pro | Enterprise |
|---|---|---|---|
Users | 2 | 2 | 2 |
Cost per user | $7 | $10 | $20 |
Monthly cost | $14 | $20 | $40 |
Features: | All Time Free features plus one integration, 24-hour email, and chat support. | All Time Starter features, plus unlimited teams and integrations, PTO tracking and approval, invoicing, payroll, expense tracking, and client and project budget management. | All the Hubstaff Desk and Field features plus VIP support, concierge set up, and unlimited job sites. |
Hubstaff Desk: Has proof of work features, time tracking, and team management
Plan | Starter | Pro | Enterprise |
|---|---|---|---|
Users | 2 | 2 | 2 |
Cost per user | $7 | $10 | $20 |
Monthly cost | $14 | $20 | $40 |
Features: | All Desk and Time Free features, including activity levels and unlimited screenshots. | All Desktop Starter and Time Pro features, including app and URL tracking, scheduling and attendance, and auto discard of idle time. | All the Hubstaff Desk and Field features plus VIP support, concierge set up, and unlimited job sites. |
Hubstaff Field: Has GPS tracking and team management
Plan | Field | Desk and Field | Enterprise |
|---|---|---|---|
Users | 2 | 2 | 2 |
Cost per user | $15 | $17 | $20 |
Monthly cost | $30 | $34 | $40 |
Features: | All time tracking features, plus work orders and jobs, mobile GPS tracking, fleet tracking, limited job sites, payments, scheduling, and attendance, invoicing, payroll, client and project management, expense tracking, and 24-hour support (email and chat). | All Desk and Field features. | All the Hubstaff Desk and Field features plus VIP support, concierge set up, and unlimited job sites. |
Hubstaff Standout Features
- Smarter, streamlined time tracking: Similar to Clockify, you can access Hubstaff through its Chrome extension or Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, or iPhone apps to track time, set limits, and get detailed time sheets to review and approve.
- Geofencing and GPS tracking: Just like Jibble, Hubstaff has geofencing features to prevent employees from forgetting to clock in/out. Its GPS tracking system allows your team to track their time while on the go while you can also see their routes as they travel. It can also record your time even when it is offline—a function that Clockify and Jibble have.
- Scheduling and Attendance Tracking: With Hubstaff, you can schedule individual or recurring shifts for your users and receive email alerts for late, missed, or abandoned shifts. You can even set a limit for the number of hours your team members can track each week which only Hubstaff can offer.
- Client Invoicing: You can invoice your clients based on the time your team has tracked in Hubstaff, as well as add your own line items.
- Payroll Management: With Hubstaff, you can track billable hours for invoicing. Also, you can automatically process payroll by just putting your employees’ hourly rate, schedule (weekly, monthly, biweekly), setup, and integrate with PayPal, Payoneer, Wise, and Bitwage. However, compared with Jibble and TimeCamp, Hubstaff does not support overtime calculations.
- Robust Employee Productivity Tools: If you are worried about your team’s real-time performance, Hubstaff will help you remove unproductive time through its app and URL tracking and idle time/inactivity warning. On the other hand, your employees’ work in progress will be monitored by capturing screenshots.
- Project Management: You can create project budgets based on hours, bill rates, or pay rates. and set up alerts and receive notifications when you’re close to going over budget.
- Time-off and Holiday requests: Unlike Clockify and Timesheet, Hubstaff allows you to set policies for time off requests and paid holidays.
- Customer support: With Hubstaff, you can have a support representative who will respond through email, live chats, on-screen shares, or video conferencing when you send a ticket which is something that other providers do not offer.
Jibble
PROS
- Free for unlimited users
- Has geofencing and GPS trackers
- Eliminates buddy punching and time theft using facial recognition
- Has a kiosk mode for physical attendance tracking
CONS
- Limited integrations (Slack and MS Teams)
- Email and chat support only, no live phone support
- Limited customization
| RATING CRITERIA | Pricing | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 |
| Employee Time Tracking Functionality | 4.50 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Billable Hours & Job Labor Costing Functions | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Popularity | 2.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Reporting | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Ease of Use | 4.25 | OUT OF | 5 |
Jibble is great for those who want a time clock with an onsite and offsite setup because of its mobile app and biometric kiosk that uses selfie capturing, facial recognition, and PIN validation. This ensures that you get accurate attendance data while time theft and buddy punching are minimized. Field workers, like those in construction companies, can also use Jibble’s GPS location to punch in or out and set geofences to allow you to track their time within authorized locations only.
In our evaluation, Jibble earned an overall score of 4.45 out of 5. It has robust billing and job labor costing and reporting features. It also scored quite high on both employee time tracking and ease of use, something users pointed out in their reviews. However, it scored lower than others in popularity mainly because it had less than 1,000 reviews online as of this writing The reviews that have been published are pretty good with few low ratings.
Jibble Pricing
- Free Plan: This has the essential time tracking features with verification and real-time alerts for managers. You can also preset time tracking policies and access GPS time tracking from a mobile or shared kiosk, biometric verification with facial recognition and PIN, location restrictions with two geofences, and automated timesheets and reports for payroll.
- Premium Plan: At $2.50 per user monthly, you get everything in the Free Plan plus multiple workgroups, with custom restrictions, one admin and two extra managers roles, location restrictions with four geofences, payroll timesheets with breaks and overtime calculations, and advanced time tracking policies and device restrictions.
- Ultimate Plan: For $5 per user monthly, you’ll get everything in Premium plus unlimited locations, managers, groups or work schedules and project and client-based time tracking.
Jibble Standout Features
- Touchless time tracking and offline mode: Aside from mobile apps and biometric attendance kiosks, Jibble is the only provider that offers speed mode tracking. This time tracking system enables users to just walk up to a kiosk-enabled device and get clocked in/out immediately without touching anything. If the connection is down, Jibble has an offline mode—just like Clockify, Hubstaff, and TMetric.
- GPS tracking and location-based attendance: Jibble has a GPS time tracker that allows your team to clock in or out with their GPS location. To prevent buddy punching, you can set geofence restrictions when you assign team members to specific locations and prevent them from punching in or out when they are out of range, the same way Timesheet’s geofence feature works. With this feature, you can quickly monitor your team’s whereabouts during a workday, including how many hours they spent at multiple job sites.
- Automated time sheets: With Jibble, you can review your employees’ time entries, track and payroll hours, including overtime regularly (daily, weekly, or monthly). Similar to TimeCamp, Jibble calculates and allows you to pay overtime work. You can also export your timesheets in their default XLS and CSV file format.
- Scheduling features: Aside from assigning your staff to their specific schedules and assigned locations, you can customize your team’s breaks, overtime rules, and automatic deductions.
TimeCamp
PROS
- Free for unlimited users and projects
- One-click time tracker
- Robust employee productivity tools
CONS
- No offline mode
- Billing and invoicing is only available when you upgrade
- Steep learning curve
| RATING CRITERIA | Pricing | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 |
| Employee Time Tracking Functionality | 4.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Billable Hours & Job Labor Costing Functions | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Popularity | 3.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Reporting | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Ease of Use | 3.50 | OUT OF | 5 |
TimeCamp is a cloud-based time tracking solution that works on any device and even within the most popular business tools. It is ideal for remote employees since it is easy to use anywhere they prefer to work. Freelancers will also be able to set up a task and project-specific keywords to automatically capture time spent on multiple projects instead of switching from one project to another, which is time-consuming.
In addition, TimeCamp has computer activity and idle time monitoring features, including optional screenshots, which are important to improving workflow transparency and assessing employee productivity. It also takes care of time sheet-based invoicing to bill your clients for work rendered and help process payment faster with PayPal.
Based on our evaluation, TimeCamp has an overall score of 4.30 out of 5. It did well on pricing, time tracking, billing, and job labor costing features. However, it got low scores on popularity and ease of use. Some users mentioned that they find some of its advanced features too complex to navigate through and that some of its tutorials are outdated.
TimeCamp Pricing
- Free Plan: This comes with project templates, bulk edits, desktop and mobile apps, one integration, tags for time entries, and PDF exporting capabilities for reports that can be used by an unlimited number of employees and projects.
- Basic Plan: At $7 per user monthly, this has all Free Plan features plus time rounding, custom reporting, team productivity tracking, billable time and budgeting, and time entry hiding. You’ll also be able to set up management roles, use unlimited integrations, and export reports in XLS.
- Pro Plan: Priced at $10 per user, per month, this has everything in basic and also allows you to customize user roles, prepare invoices, approve time sheets, and set up billing rates.
- Enterprise Plan: You get all Pro’s features plus personalized training, private cloud implementation, and a self-hosted server. Pricing is customized for this plan, so you need to contact its sales team to get a quote.
TimeCamp Standout Features
- Mobile and browser apps: TimeCamp has apps for both iPhone and Android, so you can track your time even when mobile. Its Chrome extension also allows you to capture work hours from any website, which is ideal when doing research or using cloud-based software.
- Attendance tracking: Aside from recording time entries, TimeCamp handles leave reporting and overtime reporting to facilitate accurate payroll processing—same with Jibble.
- Productivity tracking: With TimeCamp’s computer activity monitoring, idle time tracking, and optional screenshots, you can analyze how you spend your time in a workday. These features will help you stay focused on your work goal to enhance your job performance.
- Smart invoicing: TimeCamp allows you to track hours by client and jobs. It can handle both fixed-price and billable hours. When a project is done, you can create professional-looking invoices using the project’s time sheet data then add applicable tax and VAT rates. Once the invoice is prepared, you can encourage your clients to pay your invoice directly from the document via PayPal. You may also export your invoices to Xero and Quickbooks or even share them via email, PDF, or private link—a function specific to TimeCamp.
- Multiple third-party integrations: This time-tracking solution integrates with nearly 90 other applications, from project management to CRM and sales (like Asana, Jira, Zendesk, Freshdesk, QuickBooks, Xero, Salesforce, Pipedrive, Slack, and Microsoft Teams).
TMetric
PROS
- One-click retrieval of time sheet data for faster payroll processing
- Offline tracking
- PTO and leave monitoring features
- Multiple currencies for invoicing
CONS
- Limited mobile app functionality
- Limited scheduling options
- Limited productivity tracking tools
| RATING CRITERIA | Pricing | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 |
| Employee Time Tracking Functionality | 3.5 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Billable Hours & Job Labor Costing Functions | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Popularity | 2.50 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Reporting | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Ease of Use | 4.13 | OUT OF | 5 |
TMetric is a time tracking solution you can use to manage projects and run detailed reports. It is best for startups with five or fewer employees and freelancers because its free plan comes with basic time tracking and flexible reporting features for an unlimited number of projects and clients.
Aside from tracking your billable hours for accurate payroll processing, it monitors expenses per account, project, or team member, including the income you’ll receive from each project or client. TMetric also has customizable invoices (including currency) and QuickBooks Online integration, which speeds up the billing and payment processing.
TMetric has an overall score of 4.28 out of 5 in our evaluation. It scored well in pricing, billing, job labor costing, and reporting. However, users noted that its mobile app has limited functionalities. Others reported that there were some issues with its web version (the app slows down or crashes occasionally).
TMetric Pricing
- Free: $0 per month for up to five users to enable time tracking, reporting, and 50+ web apps integrations. You can also cater to an unlimited number of projects and clients.
- Professional: Priced at $5 per user monthly, you’ll get all Free plan features plus task management, invoicing, and project budgeting features.
- Business: For $7 per user monthly, you’ll have all the Professional plan features plus payroll for employees, time tracking permissions, and integrations with QuickBooks, GitLab, JIRA, and Redmine.
TMetric offers special pricing for nonprofit, educational, and government institutions. It also gives volume discounts for big teams according to the following scheme:
- 10% for workspaces with 40 or more users
- 20% for workspaces with 100 or more users
- 30% for workspaces with 200 or more users
- 40% for workspaces with 500 or more users.
TMetric Standout Features
- Time tracking: Similar to TimeCamp, you can track time spent on tasks and projects with TMetric’s one-click timer. It works on any device and even on your web apps. Mass editing time entries in just a few clicks are also possible. You can even create and categorize your time using tags or labels like milestones, location, or special status. TMetric also has idle detection, offline mode, and website and app usage tracking functionalities—features Clockify, Hubstaff, and TimeCamp also have. The difference with TMetric is that your administrators can disable time entry editing, set required fields for time entries, and permit manual and mobile time tracking functions that are unique to the software.
- Reporting and analytics: TMetric has a wide range of reports that provides detailed information about all projects, tasks, team members, and even the apps and websites they use. These reports are customizable and can be exported to PDF and CSV formats for printing or post-processing.
- Project Management: With TMetric you can add multiple projects and clients without losing track of your actual work time. Aside from putting descriptions or creating subprojects, you can set flat hourly rates for each assigned staff and bill your clients later. TMetric even allows you to set time estimates and a project budget that you can easily monitor and analyze to stay on top of your finances and maximize project profitability.
- Invoicing: There are three ways you can do invoicing for accomplished work with TMetric. You can either create an invoice and send it to your client or export a report, send it to your client, and mark the time as invoiced. If you are a current QuickBooks Online user, you can create invoices from it but you have to synchronize time from TMetric first. You can even customize your invoice’s currency, which is quite useful if you are catering to international clients.
- Team Management: You can customize workspace member profiles, create user groups, assign team leaders, and even activate/deactivate users. Aside from setting company workdays and holidays, you can monitor time-off, take real-time screenshots, and gauge your employees’ activity level using TMetric.
- Multiple third-party integrations: TMetric works well with more than 50 integrations and synchronizes time with QuickBooks Online, GitLab, Jira, and Redmine.
AccountSight
PROS
- Robust expense tracking tools
- Flexible invoicing features
- Responsive customer support
CONS
- Limited mobile app functionalities
- Lacks employee productivity tools
- Limited third-party integrations
| RATING CRITERIA | Pricing | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 |
| Employee Time Tracking Functionality | 3.50 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Billable Hours & Job Labor Costing Functions | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Popularity | 2.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Reporting | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Ease of Use | 4.38 | OUT OF | 5 |
AccountSight is a cloud-based time tracking, expense recording, and invoicing software ideal for professional services companies, consultants, and freelancers. With AccountSight, you can capture work hours by manually filling up online time sheets or using the stopwatch timer to track your projects in real time.
Another feature that is specific with AccountSight is that it also allows you to add additional comments and attach files to time sheets. When approving time sheets, you can upload individual or multiple time sheets from Excel to AccountSight for review, approval, and payment. You can also set up automatic reminders to ensure time sheets are submitted on time. AccountSight also integrates seamlessly with QuickBooks Online products and PayPal.
With an overall score of 4.28 out of 5 in our evaluation, it received high scores for its pricing, billing, and labor cost features, reporting, and ease of use. However, compared with other providers like Clockify, Hubstaff, Jibble, TimeCamp, and TMetric, it has limited time clock options. It also lacks employee productivity tools that can help improve the company’s workflow. In addition, although some users praised AccountSight for how user-friendly it is, it lacks user feedback, which affected its score on popularity.
AccountSight Pricing
- Free Plan: This is for a single user only. You can have five clients and five projects with unlimited invoicing, time, and expense approvals.
- Basic Plan: At $10 per person monthly, you get two to five seats. You also get unlimited clients, projects, invoicing, and time and expense approvals.
- Small-Group Plan: For $9 per person monthly, you get 6 to 20 users and all Basic Plan features.
- Enterprise Plan: Priced at $8 per person monthly, you are given 20 to 100 seats plus all Small Group Plan features.
When you pay in advance, the corresponding discounts vary.
- Three months advance: 5% discount
- Six months advance: 10% discount
- 12 months advance: 15% discount
AccountSight Standout Features
- Time management: You can easily fill up the weekly time sheet, save it temporarily, and conveniently submit it later. AccountSight is the only provider that lets your employees upload time sheets individually or in bulk through Excel. Managers, on the other hand, receive regular reminders to approve or reject time sheets individually or in bulk to avoid delays.
- Project planning: AccountSight allows you to plan projects and forecast resource needs, coordinate teams, and identify and allocate available resources based on role and skill set. You can also monitor forecasted versus actual hours and control costs and even track expenses for each phase and task for more efficient project planning.
- Attendance tracking: Similar to Hubstaff, Jibble, TimeCamp, and TMetric, AccountSight has an easy-to-use leave monitoring system. Time-off requests can be routed for multiple levels of approvals, and managers can view all leave requests in the dashboard’s calendar and approve/reject requests accordingly. AccountSight also works seamlessly with Outlook.
- Expense tracking: Aside from tracking work hours, AccountSight allows users to easily track and manage all project expenses—just like Hubstaff and TMetric. You can set your own expense types with charge rates or per-unit costs before completing the online expense sheets—which can be updated and submitted individually or by bulk at a specific time. Project managers can also approve or reject single, multiple, or all pending expenses simultaneously.
- Invoicing: Your project managers can create three types of invoices: recurring invoices for costs, manual invoices, and invoices based on billable hours and expenses. It also has an option to copy existing invoices. Managers can take a printout or directly email invoices to clients from the system. Administrators, on the other hand, can predefine tax rates, discounts, and price adjustments. They can also set notifications to track payment delays, send reminders to clients, and monitor the billing history of all paid and due payments.
- Reporting: Aside from reviewing and analyzing all weekly timesheet data, you can view and compare all invoiced and un-invoiced project expense data. You can also use its dashboard that will provide you with a pictorial presentation of time, expense, and invoice data—as well as an easy-to-understand summary in the form of bar and pie charts. Furthermore, online reports can be printed, saved as a PDF file, or exported to Excel.
Timesheet
PROS
- WLAN and geofencing time tracking functionalities
- Flexible invoicing features
- Cloud backup
CONS
- Lacks employee productivity tools
- Invoicing costs extra
- Limited third-party integrations
| RATING CRITERIA | Pricing | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 |
| Employee Time Tracking Functionality | 3.50 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Billable Hours & Job Labor Costing Functions | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Popularity | 4.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Reporting | 5.00 | OUT OF | 5 | |
| Ease of Use | 3.13 | OUT OF | 5 |
Timesheet is a free time tracker that can start tracking time automatically using WLAN and geofencing technology, making it suitable for construction companies. It will also stop tracking automatically when an employee leaves their assigned location. Your time data is safe because Timesheet uses cloud storage for backup—a function specific to this software. You can also add breaks, expenses, and notes into your schedule and record working hours with a simple push of a button.
Timesheet earned 4.23 out of 5 in our evaluation with high marks for pricing, billable hours and job labor costing, and reporting. What made this provider’s score lower than the other six solutions is limited integrations and the lack of employee productivity tools and an offline mode functionality.
Timesheet Pricing
- Basic Plan: This free option lets you track and export your working hours as an Excel time sheet. You can also use its automated time tracker and log your expenses, mileage, and breaks.
- Plus Plan: For $5 per month, this allows you to add your working hours, notes, and attachments using cloud storage. You also get real-time synchronization between all your devices.
- Pro Plan: Priced at $10 per user, per month, you can manage your working hours online, create PDF invoices to bill your customers, customize your Excel Export, manage costs, and integrate with Zapier, QuickBooks, and Chrome.
Timesheet Standout Features
- Automated Time Tracking: You can run the Timesheet app on your iPhone or Android smartphone and your computer. Its web application is also compatible with major browsers such as Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Internet Explorer. You can also easily add breaks, expenses, and notes into your schedule while recording working hours. For field employees, Timesheet can track working hours using WLAN and geofencing technology which is unique for this software. You’ll just need to set up your automation type, and it will automatically track your hours when you are in the assigned location point (this is similar to Jibble’s geofencing restriction).
- Project and Task Management: You can plan, track, collaborate on, and execute projects in real time from one dashboard.
- Feedback and Analytics: Review the time you spent on a project or task through in-depth reports of your daily, weekly, and monthly hours. You can also monitor time, income, and even feedback to track your progress, identify trends, improve time utilization, and weed out inefficiencies.
- Cost Management: Learn how to manage your finances by monitoring expenses, break times, and working hours. You can also gain a deeper understanding of your projects, control how you manage your workflow, and identify areas to optimize profit.
- Automated Custom and Invoice Management: Billable hours and expenses can be transformed into revenue with Timesheet’s automated and customizable invoices.
Alternatives to the Best Free Time Tracking Software
When it comes to free time tracking software, there are several options that you can consider other than the ones that we presented above that made our final top seven based on our scoring system. Some of these alternative options may have unique features and integrations that you may find useful to your business.
Here are the seven free time tracking alternatives:
Homebase: Best for Restaurants and Retail Shops That Need POS Integration
Homebase is a free time tracker and scheduling software that integrates with popular POS apps and is accessible from multiple devices. Your employees and contractors can review schedules, trade shifts, request time off, and communicate with co-workers. Homebase also helps you stay compliant by tracking paid and unpaid breaks and by keeping track of missed shifts, breaks, clock-outs, and overtime. It lacks client invoicing capabilities and has limited third-party integrations, but many users still find its time tracking features robust even though there were some reported occasional glitches.
You can sign up for a free account to get started with Homebase. If you need to track time for more than one location, you will need to upgrade to a paid plan (starts at $19.95 per month). Paid subscriptions include features such as auto-scheduling, advanced schedule forecasting, and a dedicated account manager.
Harvest: Best for Freelancers That Require Free Invoicing and Expense Reporting
Harvest offers free time tracking, invoicing, and expense reporting for one user and two active projects. The free plan is ideal for freelancers that don’t need to give other users access to their data. Harvest also integrates with other popular software like QuickBooks, Google Workspace, Trello, and Slack, so you can easily export hours. It has a paid plan that comes with unlimited seats and projects (starts at $12 per user, per month). Users said it has a user-friendly interface but found its paid upgrade expensive. You can get started with Harvest by heading over to its website and signing up for a free account.
Timetrack: Ideal for Business Owners That Need Multilingual Support
Timetrack is a free time tracker that offers multilingual support. This is a unique feature not offered in any of the other apps on our list. With Timetrack, you can track time using a timer or via manual entry or import time from an Excel spreadsheet. Time is tracked when you are online and offline, and it is configured based on your location’s time zone. Once you are back online, your data will automatically sync. You can easily collaborate with your team using Timetrack, and you can also use its detailed client reporting.
Timetrack is free of charge if the numbers of users, projects, and reports are fewer than or equal to 10. If you have more than that, you’ll have to pay using the following prices, which were converted July 30, 2021:
- $0.23 (€0.20) per registered User
- $0.11 (€ 0.10) per registered Project
- $0.41 (€ 0.35) per registered Report
To get started with Timetrack, you can sign up for a free account and start tracking your time right away. If you need to track time for more than 10 people, we recommend you choose Clockify, Jibble, or TimeCamp instead, as they allow you to track time for an unlimited number of users for free.
Toggl Track: Best for Businesses That Need Multiple Third-Party Integrations
Toggl Track is a free time tracker that is ideal for businesses that require multiple third-party integrations. It works well with more than 100 tools—including Asana, Basecamp, Trello, Redmine, and Xero. Toggl Track also has a one-click timer that tracks time across platforms (web, desktop, mobile, or browser extension), and all your entries will sync automatically. You can also access background tracking and calendar integrations. It also has powerful reporting tools, project and revenue tracking, and team scheduling features.
Its free plan allows you to track time by project, task, or employee but only for a single user. However, if you need to track time for more than one user, you can sign up for a paid plan. Paid plans start at $10 per user, per month and include advanced features like a project dashboard and priority tech support.
Paymo: Ideal For Companies That Need Automated Payments
Paymo is a free time tracking software that allows you to create multilingual invoices that incorporate more than 85 currencies. It also lets users get paid faster by automating payments with PayPal, Payoneer, Stripe, and Authorize.net.
The free account allows you to create three invoices per month and manage unlimited projects and clients. If you need to track time for multiple users, you will need to upgrade to a paid plan (starts at $11.95 per user, per month). Users reported that tracking time and creating invoices are easy with Paymo. On the other hand, some find it difficult to navigate the program.
todo.vu: Best for Consultants and Freelancers Who Require Strong Accounting Software Integration
todo.vu is a business management software with free time tracking and accurate billing features. It lets you manage your tasks and time in one place to minimize errors, get more detailed and better reporting results, and edit time entries and identify nonbillable hours. Multiple staff can add time entries to the same task. It also has CRM, project management, and billing capabilities—as well as seamless integration with several accounting software, including Xero, FreshBooks, and Zoho Books.
Its free plan is for one user and has time tracking, task management, and recording and billing features. If you want to increase the number of users, you can get a paid plan (starts at $9 per user, per month) that has 2GB of cloud storage and priority tech support.
aTimeLogger: Ideal for Freelancers Who Want to Track Professional and Personal Time
If you’re looking for a free time tracker that tracks both your work and personal hours, then consider aTimeLogger. It includes 12 categories you can track time for, including work, sleep, self-care, reading, and shopping. You can review your daily log and figure out where your time is going, and you can also customize your user interface. aTimeLogger allows you to set goals and notifies you when you reach them. Detailed reports can be run to filter by a category, and data can be displayed in pie or bar chart format.
It’s easy to get started with aTimeLogger. Just download the mobile app and provide your contact details. If you have an iOS device, the app is 100% free to use; however, if you have an Android device, paid plans start at $1 per user, per month. Paid subscriptions offer premium features such as stats, custom icons, and alerts.
Bottom Line
Now that we have provided you with numerous free time tracker options, it’s time for you to pick one that suits your needs. However, if you are looking for solutions with more advanced features and are willing to pay for them, check out our guide to the best time tracking software.
We recommend Clockify if you just want a free option that allows unlimited users and projects. Once you sign up for an account, you can immediately start tracking your work hours using its start/stop timer.
