I was looking for a time tracking app for my personal use. After investigating a few options, I decided that it would be a great idea to create a write-up of the 12 time tracking systems I tried. All of these systems are very good at recording and reporting on hours spent on projects/tasks. There are many bells and whistles to each of these systems; however, my requirement was simple. I needed to simply set up projects and have a start/stop timer for each project. Then at the end of the month, get a comprehensive report on the hours spent on each project. So for each product, I review here, you will see my basic requirements being located and executed on the respective app.
These products are not listed in any particular order, and I did not choose a number one or number 12. I simply wrote a quick summary of my experience with each product. This article was not meant as a complete guide into each of the app’s strengths and weaknesses, although that may be a great follow-up article. If you are one of the vendors I demoed and believe I did not report properly on you, PLEASE reply to this post. Corrections can be made. If I missed your product, again, PLEASE reply to this post. I would love to get you included in this article.
Get your popcorn out; this article has over 3000 words and took two days to research & write.
OnTheClock
- Monthly pricing: starting at $2.30 per user, no base fee
- Free Account: Yes
- Phone Apps: Yes
- Integrations: Yes
- www.ontheclock.com
Setting up an account with OnTheClock is straightforward, quick, and simple. Directly after opening your free 30-day trial, you can add your team(employees). OnTheClock will automatically send invites to each person, making employee onboarding super easy. Once employees receive the invites, they can log in to their user portal or download the app to clock in/out. As the admin, you can set up geofencing or IP restrictions to ensure your employees are at work while punching in and out. There is a handy Whos-In page where you can monitor employee’s status. Timesheets for job costing or payroll can be easily generated using predefined or custom reporting. Overall, this system is easy to use. For a team of 10, your total monthly bill will be $25.
Tick
- Monthly pricing: starting at $19 for ten projects, unlimited users
- Free Account: Yes
- Phone Apps: Yes
- Integrations: Yes
- www.tickspot.com
Creating a new Tick account was quick and straightforward. I was immediately asked to create a project and task for tracking time, and I’m off to a great start. I see that tick is more geared towards hand entering time than using timers to monitor time as the “Enter Time” button is way bigger than the start timer button. Timecard navigation is straightforward. It defaults to today's date, or just click the tabbed dates to navigate. Creating new projects and clients is simple, just click new and fill in the fields. Adding team members and sending invites was also simple and intuitive; just enter the name and email, and the invite gets sent. Reporting is robust and complete. You can run a custom report, look at past projects, and view problem projects (think overruns on time) using the “What projects need my attention?” report. Tick has an excellent product, which includes phone apps and many integrations. Monthly Pricing is based on the number of projects, not users. For ten projects, your monthly fee would be $19 (with unlimited users!)
Trigger
- Monthly pricing: starting at $11 per user
- Free Account: Yes
- Phone Apps: No, but in the works
- Integrations: Many
- www.triggerapp.com
After signup, I was immediately brought to the dashboard. Here I can create companies (clients), projects, tasks, and perform other everyday tasks. I decided to go right to add a project and company for the project. This was easy to do and took only seconds. With Trigger, time is allocated using tasks associated with projects/clients. Workers can manually hand enter time or use a timer to start/stop time for the task. There are schedule and calendar views that help managers monitor and track the productivity and progress of projects. The timesheets section shows all billable hours and can be filtered and exported to CSV(Excel). Invoices are also simple to create for individual companies. Reporting is also robust with reports for tasks/employees, timesheets, billable hours, and hours by the company. For support, trigger offers live chat, which is nice for speedy issue resolution. Trigger integrates with many other SaaS products such as Xero, FreshBooks, and Slack. Phone apps are included as well. Pricing starts at $11 per user per month for the most basic plan.
AccountSight
- Monthly pricing: starting at $10 per user
- Free Account: Yes
- Phone Apps: No
- Integrations: Quickbooks
- www.accountsight.com
Setting up a new AccountSight account was fast and simple. I filled out the signup form, and my account was instantly created and accessible. I was brought to the home page to access basic functions such as settings, entering time/expenses, and invoices/reporting. I love it when services have friendly dashboards like this. I’m interested in time tracking, so I click on “Time,” and the time entry page appears. Here, I can create a new entry with its associated project and task. I can simply hand enter time or use the start/stop timer to record my time. The Planning section gives me a dashboard that lets me see at a glance hours by the manager, location, project, and department, along with different combinations of the categories. There are also expenses, invoices, and payables sections. These sections offer the ability to track and act upon the entries in each area. Reporting offers ten basic report types, the report center around four basic categories: time, resources, utilization, and financial. There are easy-to-use filters for each report; I found the reporting adequate for most of my needs. Monthly pricing starts at $10 per user; a free account is available for a single user.
Ronin
- Monthly pricing: starting at $15 per user
- Free Account: Yes
- Phone Apps: No
- Integrations: Several
- www.roninapp.com
Ronin was very easy to signup, as it should be with any SaaS time tracking solution. After signup, I am brought to a dashboard to perform basic tasks such as adding clients/projects, invoicing, and account settings. One of the first things I did was create a project. After entering the project name and hourly billing amount, the project sprang to life. I noticed that I could set a budget for the project but decided I would not need this now. Time can be manually entered for projects or tracked with a start/stop timer. The Client’s area is clean and concise, and Ronin did a great job managing clients and associated client projects. Creating invoices is a breeze! I clicked the “create invoice” button, select the client and enter items/QTY/price, and the invoice can be printed or even sent directly to the client. There are also estimate and expense sections where you can perform the respective tasks. One unique feature was the concept of products where I could add and manage my products. Reporting is simple and concise. All the bases are covered with reports for invoicing, payments, timesheets, expenses, and estimates. Ronin offers a free account and a paid monthly account that starts at $15 per user.
FunctionFox
- Monthly pricing: starting at $35 for 1st user. $5 for additional
- Free Account: No
- Phone Apps: No
- Integrations: No
- www.functionfox.com
Upon opening my FunctionFox demo, I found my account pre-populated with clients, projects, and tasks. This was nice for testing as it allowed me to dive right into the product. The general layout of all functions such as timesheets, clients, and projects is intuitive and easy to recognize. I jumped into the timesheets page. With the pre-populated client of Acme, I quickly saw the start timer and clicked to start logging time. The CEO desktop provides an excellent high-level summary of all critical metrics such as client hours, billable vs. non-billable staff hours, and project statuses. The clients, personnel (staff), and projects sections provided quick and easy management of their respective functions. Reporting is also easy yet very functional, with many filters and export/print options. Monthly pricing starts at $35 per month for the first employee and $5 per employee after that. An app is available for mobile users.
MyHours
- Monthly pricing: starting at $7 per user
- Free Account: Yes
- Phone Apps: Yes
- Integrations: No
- www.myhours.com
Opening the My Hours account went very smoothly. Directly after signup, I was brought to a setup wizard. The wizard allowed me to create projects/tasks quickly, invite team members, and set basic account settings – excellent work, MyHours! After finishing the wizard, I was directed to the “TRACK” section, where I could create a timer with one click and started tracking time right away. Multiple timers can be set up and assigned to projects and tasks. Times can use the start/stop feature, obviously, but MyHours made it ridiculously easy to hand enter times/durations as well. The activity tab allows filtering and summarizes time used by day, client, project, task, or team member. MyHours has simple yet complete reporting abilities; activity, economy, and budget seem to be popular ones. They even offer a pivot report where you can customize how time is shown for projects, tasks, and clients. Management of lists such as clients, projects, and team members is kept concise and consistent, and as we know, people like things to be consistent. MyHours has done a great job of including all the necessary options, but not so many that the product is difficult to learn and use. Monthly pricing starts at $7 per user, and a free account is available for 1 user.
Timecamp
- Monthly pricing: starting at $7 per user
- Free Account: Yes
- Phone Apps: Yes
- Integrations: Yes
- www.timecamp.com
An email address and password are required to open a Timecamp account. Nice and simple! After signup, I was directed to the settings area where I could set basic account settings. My main area of interest was tracking time for projects, so I clicked on “Projects” and added my first project. Adding the project was simple and intuitive. I only had to enter the name as other details could be filled in later. Next, I went to the timesheet, and with two clicks, I was able to create a timer for my project and start tracking time – you made this very easy for me, Timecamp! If you’re a data junkie, then you're going to love Timecamp’s report section. There are reports for projects, budgets, real-time, revenue, attendance, just to name a few! There are integrations, and after looking at all the products timecamp integrates with, I was wowed as they integrate with all notable SaaS products on the planet.
Timely
- Monthly pricing: starting at $8 per user
- Free Account: No
- Phone Apps: Yes
- Integrations: Yes
- www.timelyapp.com
The new account setup was fast and simple with Timely. After a few questions and instructions, I was up and running with the system. One of the first things I noticed was their “Memory” timeline view. This is a very unique and intuitive way to view a day of tasks, meetings, etc. I also wanted to add a project for a customer. In just a few clicks, the project was added and ready to accept time. A few things I liked about projects were allowing multiple tags and having time/money budget options. Heading back to the “Hours” section, I saw my new project, clicked it, and could start the timer. So far very easy and intuitive to use. Inviting team members requires only a name and email. The invitation is automatically sent - this saves me valuable time. The reporting section has a very nice dashboard where I can filter/sort and get a bird's eye view of everything. Additionally, there is a timesheets tab where I can drill down into specific concerning projects and time. PDF and Excel exports are also available here. Computer and phone apps are also available for time tracking and viewing time. Hats off to Timely! They have created a simple yet powerful time tracking system.
Paydirt
- Monthly pricing: starting at $8 per user
- Free Account: No
- Phone Apps: No
- Integrations: Yes
- www.paydirtapp.com
Paydirt sign-up was smooth and uneventful - good job, guys! Upon sign on, the welcome page gives me a list of the things I will need to do next, such as creating tasks/clients, logging time, and inviting my team. As a bonus, several options had videos or tours on how to perform the function. Clicking on the “Clients” tab brings me to the client list. I went ahead and added one client. Inside the client’s page, I can create projects, quotes, and invoices for that client. I create my project/task that is nested under the client and am now ready to track some time. So far, I like the system, and it has taken only a couple of minutes to set up the account and a client/project/task. Now, I want to track some time on the task. I have noticed the floating “Time Tracker” button in the lower right corner. I click, it, select my task, and the timer starts. The floating “Time Tracker” button is a unique and valuable feature. I like it! On to reporting, the reporting section is concise and straightforward. There are three tabs, an overview, time logged, and project budgets tabs. These tabs provide all the basic information I will need for monitoring time logged. There are also options to print and export to Excel here. Paydirt has done a very nice job of providing a complete time tracking app yet keeping it simple to learn and use daily. Monthly pricing starts at $8 per user.
TRACKINGTIME
- Monthly pricing: starting at $4.99 per user
- Free Account: Yes
- Phone Apps: Yes
- Integrations: Yes
- www.trackingtime.co
An email and password were all it took to sign up. After that, I was brought through an immaculate setup wizard asking me questions about how I would be tracking time. After about 45 seconds, I had completed the wizard, and the system automatically started tracking time on the project I had just created – beautiful implementation here, guys! I was brought to the tasks section, where I could see my newly created time counting up at the top of the screen, along with standard task management functions. The dashboard gives me an excellent top-down view of account activity, running projects, and hours. The activity tab lists all time entries, including start/stop timers and hand-entered hours; you can specify a duration, e.g., 2.1 hours, or start/stop times like 1:00 pm and 2:35 pm. There is also a calendar view to see time entries in traditional calendar formats such as a month, week, and 10. This will be helpful for monthly or weekly employee and project time reviews. The reporting section has three basic sections – timesheets, projects, and custom reports. The timesheets report section gives a nice breakdown of all the time entries and a few graphs to understand the time visually. The projects report section lists each project and associated time. Custom reports allow you to pull and bookmark (save) special reports when the timesheets and project reports are insufficient. TRACKINGTIME has produced an exceptionally easy-to-use and powerful tool for tracking and reporting on time. Monthly pricing starts at $4.99 per user and they also have a free plan (but limited) for teams of 3. One unique pricing method they have is by the hours for $24.99, and you receive 500 hours of tracked time. Phone apps and many 3rd party integrations are also available with this product.
Toggl
- Monthly pricing: starting at $9 per user
- Free Account: Yes
- Phone Apps: Yes
- Integrations: Many
- www.toggl.com
Upon account creation, I was immediately asked to create a timer. I typed in “Computer Programming” as I am a programmer, then clicked the start button to start tracking time for the task. I have to say that I am impressed with the speed at which I started tracking time. After creating the account, I was tracking time within 10 seconds. With Toggl, creating clients and projects for the clients was a breeze. The user interface is super intuitive. The ability to invite team members and let them self-onboard is a huge time saver. The dashboard provides an excellent view into what is going on for the week, or you can pull date ranges. Reports can be filtered by team, client & project then viewed on-screen or exported to PDF or Excel. Toggl has all the features any company needs to track time for billing, including phone apps and integrations into many other platforms. Pricing starts at $10/employee (monthly).
Hours
Directly after signup, I was brought to the timers section. Here in the timers section, I click “Add New Timer” and am prompted to enter a project name (or select an existing project). I can also change the project color - nice feature, I like it! Next, I enter the client name (I could skip if desired) and optionally a task for the project. I now click the timer to start tracking time. I’m off to a very efficient start to using Hours! I notice that Hours has done an excellent job of keeping the UI clean easy to navigate. Next, the dashboard section gives me a high-level overview of all clients, projects, tasks, and time. I can add time entries along with clients/projects here at the dashboard as well. This is a great time-saving feature. Inviting one or more team members is very functional. I liked the fact that I could add multiple comma-separated email address all at the same time. After the invite is sent, the team member on boards themselves. The reports section defaults to a monthly summary of all time and the respective clients/projects. I can customize the time frame by month, weekday,, and many other choices. There are also many grouping and filtering options for those who like to customize things. One unique feature I thought would be useful was the ability to share via link a report, useful for emailing a report without the need to export/attach a file. Hours has apps for iPhone, Android, and Apple Watch - I can see the Watch app being extremely useful! Hours is a beautiful implementation of a time tracking application, clean and complete. Pricing starts at $8 per user for monthly plans.
