How To Create a Timesheet in Excel

Are you looking to create a timesheet in Excel?

If so, you’re in the right place!

This article will show you how to make a time tracking sheet in Excel, give you a few Excel timesheet templates, and explore the cons of tracking time in Excel.

(We’ll show you a better alternative, too)

5 steps to start tracking time in Excel or Google Sheets

Here’s a simple five-step process to start tracking time in a spreadsheet.

1. Add your timesheet labels
2. Add time-related labels
3. Add financial labels
4. Add your formulas
5. Use our free templates instead

😈

1. Add your timesheet labels

Start with the basics and add your company name, type of timesheet (weekly in this example), your employees name, and their number of regular hours per day.

2. Add time-related labels

Next, you will want to add timesheet labels for the following:

• Day of the week
• Start time
• Break start and end times
• End time
• Regular hours
• Overtime hours
• Total hours

3. Add financial labels

Now the important fields. The 💰 labels!

You can add the following:

• Total hours for the week
• Hourly rate
• Overtime hourly rate
• Total billable hours for the week

4. Add your formulas

Now comes the complicated part. Spreadsheet formulas. 😢

Adding an excel timesheet formula to a stupid amount of columns. 😢

But don’t worry — you can find examples of some basic formulas below!

For the ‘Regular hours’ column, you will want to add the following formula in the first cell

=IF(K12>1/3,1/3,K12)

For the ‘Overtime hours’

=K12-I12

The following for ‘Total Hours’

=H12-C12-(E12-D12)-(G12-F12)

This for ‘Total Hours of The Week’

=SUM(K12:K18)

Aaaaaaaand the following for ‘Total Billable for the Week’

=(K20*SUM(I12:I18)+K21*SUM(J12:J18))*24

Your team will then be able to log their hours each day and, by the end of the week, have their total billable owed calculated automatically! 👏

I know.

A little confusing. 🙃

But it would be best if you didn’t go through the pain of creating your own timesheet template.

So…

5. Use our free templates instead

Download our free Excel timesheet templates.

Much better than creating your own from scratch, right? 😈

Free Excel timesheets

Feel free to alter and format cells to suit your needs.

All timesheet templates will automatically calculate the total billable hours worked.

Daily Excel timesheet template

This basic timesheet template is ideal for tracking how employees, freelancers, and contractors spend their time daily. Users can log their hours in half-hour time slots. Just enter an hourly rate and fill in the blanks.

Download your daily timesheet template.

Weekly Excel timesheet template

This weekly timesheet template is ideal for tracking how employees, freelancers, and contractors spend their time every week. By filling in the blanks, you’ll find empty spaces where the user can effortlessly record start times, end times, breaks, and overtime. You can also add the employees hourly rate.

Download your weekly template.

Biweekly Excel timesheet template

The biweekly timesheet template is ideal for tracking how employees, freelancers, and contractors spend their time biweekly. Just like the weekly timesheet (except this one has two tables), the user can log start times, end times, breaks, and overtime by filling in the blanks.

Download your biweekly template.

Monthly Excel timesheet template

Our monthly timesheet template lets you track employee hours with ease. It’s ideal for tracking your hours worked and how employees, freelancers, and contractors spend their time monthly.

Download your monthly template.

Excel time tracking — is there an alternative?

Don’t get me wrong — I think our timesheet templates are solid.

But are spreadsheets your best option?

I’ve chatted with a few agencies that use spreadsheets to track employee hours — and they always say how chaotic they are.

• Files get copied.
• Some go “missing.”
• Formulas are unintentionally edited.
• People don’t tend to fill them in all that much.
• You’re unable to quickly get insights you can leverage (more on this later).

You also have to remember that employees tend to hate time tracking in general. So using a spreadsheet to track their time may not be the best approach.

Are there better alternatives?

Yep! 👇

A modern online timesheet app is the best way to keep track of employees hours — especially for teams that work on client projects and tasks all day.

Unlike spreadsheets, many of the best timesheet apps come with features that help to automate and streamline the entire time tracking process.

Using a time tracker like Toggl Track, you will have access to a web, desktop, and two mobile apps.

You can quickly start tracking your time by entering a time entry description and hitting the timer button.

It takes a few seconds to switch the timer to a different task (especially if projects and tasks are already set up).

1. Type in your “time entry description”
2. Find your client
3. Select what “project” you’re working on
4. Start the timer

Easy!

Once you or your team start tracking your time, you can access your time tracking data within our Reports Dashboard.

You will be able to view your data using multiple reports

• Summary report – Offers an overview of the time tracked. The top half of the report is a bar graph showing time entries by date, whereas the second half includes a grouped list of time entries and a pie chart.

• Detailed Report – includes a list of all time entries based on the chosen filters in chronological order. Use this report to go through time entries with a fine-tooth comb using our Audit feature or as an attachment to your client invoices.

• Weekly Report – For a weekly overview, use the Weekly Report. This report shows hours tracked by day, split by activity. Users can also sign up for a weekly overview email with their hours on their Profile page.

You can learn more about our Reports Dashboard in the video below.

Remember how I mentioned that spreadsheets couldn’t quickly provide data insights you can leverage?

Most time tracking tools should allow you to quickly dig deeper into data you can leverage to improve business processes or increase project profits.

If you’re using Toggl Track, you will have access to our Insights Dashboard.

It will give instant access to data such as employee and project profitability, total project earnings, labor cost, etc.

Check out our knowledge base articles below to learn more.

• Project dashboard to monitor performance
• Insights to assess project profitably
• Billable rates per project and team member
• Fixed fee projects to track costs against a set fee
• Recurring projects for retainers and ongoing work