These days, top talent gets hired fast — or at least they expect to (and they should!). This means that, in 2025, to attract and retain top candidates (and get them on board before your competitors can), you’ll need to optimize your hiring processes to make them quick and effortless for both the hiring team and candidates.

There are several ways to save time and increase hiring efficiency, but in the year ahead, candidate assessment tools are slated to be a popular way to source, assess, and hire the best talent while helping your HR team improve operational efficiency (honestly, assessment tests are already a top way to source great talent while improving other recruiting metrics…but that’s beside the point).

To ensure you don’t get left behind as your competitors embrace hiring technology the right way, we’ve compiled a list of the very best candidate assessment tools in the market, complete with all the information you need about their pricing, top features, and best use cases.

TL;DR — Key Takeaways

• Candidate assessment tools help hiring teams assess various types of skills, including technical, job-related, and soft skills.

• Using these tools in your hiring process has many benefits, but primarily, they help hiring teams save time and money on screening and provide a better candidate experience.

• When choosing your candidate assessment tool, consider various important factors, such as what skills you want to test for, the integrations you need, the number and type of templates, and more.

• Toggl Hire is one of the best candidate assessment tools for skills testing. The full-cycle hiring tool offers robust candidate assessment features, including 200+ types of tests from our skills test library, plus other helpful tools like a candidate pipeline, homework assignments, and more.

What are candidate assessment tools?

Candidate assessment tools are hiring tools designed to help recruiters assess the soft and hard skills of job applicants. These tools help HR professionals screen candidates and their skills early on in the hiring process. That way, they only spend time on the most qualified candidates at the later stages, such as interviews and take-home tasks.

Some use cases include:

• Reducing a large pool of applicants from hundreds or thousands of candidates to a handful of the very best ones that meet your standards

• Using soft skills tests to find out which of the top-performing candidates have the most well-rounded skill set

• Using standardized tests to ensure there’s no hiring bias

• Testing a set of skills using a pre-built assessment test from a library for skills your hiring team is unfamiliar with or might not have the internal expertise to create a skills test for

• Reducing the time to hire and improving the candidate experience by shortening the application time to minutes instead of hours at a time

• Reducing the reliance on cover letters and resumes as hiring tools (or replacing them entirely…because 36% of people openly admit to lying on their resumes) in favor of what’s more important—the skills needed to get the job done!

As you can see, any company with a role to fill can benefit from using a candidate assessment tool. But these aren’t the only benefits of implementing talent assessment software in the early stages of your hiring pipeline.

7 benefits of using candidate assessment tools

Traditional hiring processes are clunky, obsolete, and take too long — and that’s true for both the candidates and the businesses looking to hire them. Employee skill testing is an efficient way to streamline the hiring process, improve your key HR metrics, and keep the candidate experience stellar.

Some pre-employment assessment tools excel at helping with specific points of the hiring process or with certain pain points, so jot down which of these benefits is the most important for you so you can compare the tools more effectively later when we walk you through each one individually.

1. Efficient candidate screening

On average, a job opening receives 118 applications. It’s time-consuming to go through every application in detail, and that’s assuming you only get 118 applicants. Toggl teams typically receive thousands of applicants per job posting, for example.

Pre-employment assessment tools allow you to automate the initial candidate evaluation and reduce internal headaches or time sucks. You choose how high to set the threshold for your applicants, and instead of submitting a resume, candidates complete a test, which means you only have to spend time on the best applicants who score above your threshold (we usually recommend 80%!).

It also reduces the manual task of sifting through applications. Using a pre-employment assessment test as the first step of the hiring process saves immense time for your hiring team and allows you to dedicate it to the most promising candidates later in the process.

2. Objective, data-driven hiring

Hiring managers are people, after all, and people are prone to mistakes. They want to hire the best candidates, but a lot of time, unconscious biases come into play.

Your hiring team can unknowingly favor candidates with a certain background, race, age, ethnicity, or even hobby. Assessment tests nip this problem in the bud, allowing you to see the candidates’ test results first before seeing their names, faces, ages, or previous employment history.

This allows for better, more objective decision-making and helps you hire based on skills rather than gut feeling.

3. Enhanced predictive analytics

The traditional hiring process has a major flaw—you can’t predict someone’s job performance based on their resume, cover letter, or interview. While pre-employment assessment tools aren’t foolproof either, you can assess someone’s ability to complete certain on-the-job tasks by testing their skills.

For example, a cognitive ability test can reveal a candidate’s problem-solving skills. A technical test assessing certain coding skills would also provide insight into a potential on-the-job performance.

4. Improved hire quality

Some people are great at crafting compelling resumes, and others are great interviewers. When it comes down to it, you don’t want to hire either of those — you want a great performer.

Pre employment assessment tools let you test a candidate’s soft skills, verbal ability, physical ability, you name it. They allow you to hire better people and save money in the short and long run, which is a pretty big deal when you consider that hiring the wrong person can cost you as much as $17,000.

5. Consistent evaluation criteria

Whether using physical ability tests, cognitive ability tests, emotional intelligence tests, or something else, job assessments ensure that each applicant is treated fairly regardless of their background or job experience.

Using these tools ensures you’ll have a fairly standardized process in place to ensure that every candidate has the same chance of getting the job.

6. Time and cost savings

Remember when we said the average job opening attracts 118 applicants?

Calculate the internal cost of reviewing over 100 applications. Consider the hours and days required for your HR team to dedicate time to each application. This is the most time-consuming part of the recruitment process, as many candidates don’t even have the basic skills necessary for the role.

Pre-employment tests automate and optimize the bulk of the candidate screening. With Toggl Hire, for example, you can choose from a library of 200+ pre-made tests to assess the candidate’s skills. To weed out unqualified candidates, set a pass threshold as high or low as you want.

Doing so allows you to save considerable time and money, which you can devote to detailed profile reviews, interviews, etc., for only the best candidates.

7. Improved candidate experience

83% of candidates say a negative candidate experience could change their minds about a role or company, so it’s crucial that candidates find the application process as effortless as possible (and if you can showcase your company culture in the process, it’s a win-win situation!).

Skills assessment tests improve the candidate experience by streamlining the entire process. A standard employment test takes about 15 minutes for the candidate and allows them to show off their hard-earned skills, as opposed to asking them to spend hours editing their resumes and writing cover letters (yuck).

Moreover, traditional hiring rewards people who are great at preparing resumes rather than those who are skilled at their job. Assessment tests give everyone a chance to show what they’re capable of rather than how skilled they are at writing assignments or editing CVs in Canva.

Types of online assessment tools

Online assessment tools offer various features and tests for numerous skills — coding skills, learning ability, numerical reasoning, job performance, personality, and much more. Depending on your needs, you should choose one that offers the most relevant pre-employment assessments for your business.

Cognitive ability tests

Cognitive ability tests assess a candidate’s cognitive skills, including logic and reasoning, problem-solving, critical thinking, abstract thinking, communication, and more. No matter the role you’re hiring for, testing for cognitive skills in addition to technical ones is a smart idea, as cognitive skills are crucial in any department and at any level.

Job knowledge tests

Job knowledge assessments test if the applicant has the practical skills to do the job, testing for more technical skills tests, such as coding tests, QA skills tests, SEO skills tests, social media manager skills tests, and others. These tests are extremely practical and can be predictors of job performance.

Skills assessment tests

Skills assessment tests refer to any type of test you offer candidates that test skills — soft, hard, technical, etc. For example, JavaScript coding tests can show you how well a candidate can understand and write code, and you can combine that test with a soft skills assessment to test leadership and management abilities if hiring for a Senior Software Developer role.

Emotional intelligence tests

Hard skills are important, but proper hiring decisions require a thorough assessment of a candidate’s soft skills, too, and emotional intelligence tests measure how well a candidate can recognize emotions in others as well as manage their own. If you’re hiring for a customer-facing role or one that requires heavy collaboration, testing for emotional intelligence is crucial.

The 16 best candidate assessment tools

Ready to use candidate assessment tools? We’re so glad we’ve convinced you! Figuring out what you need from a tool is the first step to choosing the right one. Once you have a general idea of what you’re looking for, it’s helpful to compare features, pricing, and more — which is exactly what we’ve done for you below.

1. Toggl Hire

While Toggl Hire is a full-cycle recruitment platform, which means it helps teams hire from the job description to offer, it’s also one of the best skills-based hiring tools because it comes with hundreds of pre-built skills assessment templates for different jobs.

However, it stands out as a top choice because it also helps you make hiring decisions more quickly and efficiently and saves time and money for your business by combining hiring tests, video interviews, homework tasks, interview scorecards, and a candidate pipeline all in one place.

Pricing: There are no hidden costs or fine print—you pay the same price every month, and if you enter a hiring freeze, you can freeze Toggl Hire. A free plan is available, and paid plans start at just $199 per month (when billed annually).

Sounds like exactly what you’ve been looking for? Get started today for free!

2. Codility

Hiring for technical roles? Create assessments specifically for technical developer roles with Codility. This talent assessment tool supports over 40 different coding languages and has a bank of questions created and vetted by expert programmers.

However, due to the complex nature of the coding tests, they often take longer for candidates to complete (anywhere from 30 to 120 minutes). This might be seen as a drawback for some, especially if your goal is to improve the candidate experience by streamlining the hiring process.

Pricing: This is one of Codility’s major drawbacks, as the pricing isn’t very transparent. You have to contact the support team to find out how much it costs. Online reviews note that it starts at $5,000 per month, making it one of the pricier options on this list.

Check out this page to compare Toggl Hire with Codility.

3. Vervoe

Vervoe offers features similar to Toggl Hire, like personality templates, video interviews, candidate scorecards, ATS integration, and a public API useful for integrating assessment tests natively into existing web pages or other platforms.

However, Vervoe lacks certain modern HR features. For example, there’s no visual hiring pipeline or automated screening features, and you can’t create a vetted candidate pool. Also, there’s currently no free plan.

Pricing: Plans start at $19 per month (when billed annually), making it one of the more affordable tools on this list.

For more info on how Vervoe compares to Toggl Hire, check out this page.

4. TestGorilla

With TestGorilla, you can create your own custom tests or choose from a library of questions for different roles and work-related tasks. You can also invite candidates to take tests straight from your existing ATS through email or by sharing a direct link.

Like Toggl Hire, TestGorilla also provides candidates with real-time feedback and internal teams with candidate analytics. However, TestGorilla does not have job templates or a visual hiring pipeline.

Pricing: A free plan allows you to create up to five free tests. Paid plans start as low as $75/month when billed annually.

For a detailed comparison of TestGorilla vs Toggl Hire, view this helpful comparison.

5. HackerRank

If you want to fill developer roles, HackerRank is one of the obvious choices to go for, as it includes over 35 programming languages, a public-facing API, and plenty of ATS integrations. Plus, the tests are fairly easy to create.

Unfortunately, HackerRank does not support iOS and Android skills tests, which is odd for an app that tests development skills. If you’re specifically looking for these technical skills tests, you’ll have to use another platform.

Pricing: HackerRank is pretty pricey at $100/month for one user and ten tests. However, even their most basic plan comes with leaked-question detection and plagiarism detection.

Read more about HackerRank features versus Toggl Hire for testing technical skills here.

6. iMocha

This AI-powered tool has over 200 different taxonomies, 1,500+ job profiles, and over 2,500 different hard and soft skills you can test for. It also boasts a comprehensive suite of tools for talent management and talent acquisition.

The biggest drawback of using iMocha for candidate assessment is that you can’t see the full hiring funnel, and the user experience isn’t as seamless as other tools on this list.

Pricing: Like a true enterprise-level tool, you have to contact sales to get a quote. There is no free plan, but there is a free trial.

We covered everything you need to know about iMocha vs. Toggl Hire here.

7. TestDome

Built to assess programming skills, TestDome offers more than 150 different types of tests and allows you to create custom tests easily.

Cool, useful features include advanced anti-cheating measures, such as webcam proctoring, copy/paste protection, double IP detection, and more (whether this is a positive checkmark for this tool or something that could potentially scare candidates off is up to you to determine).

Pricing: You pay per candidate who applies for a job, with pricing starting at $7 per candidate.

8. Adaface

From coding to psychometrics and personality tests, Adaface covers a wide range of use cases. In total, there are 500+ different skills you can test for, meaning it has one of the most robust skills test libraries of all the candidate assessment tools on this list.

With anti-cheating measures, such as questions that are not “Googleable” and webcam proctoring, Adaface is ideal for ensuring you hire great performers, not cheaters. However, it lacks a user-friendly and optimized backend that can help manage the entire candidate pipeline.

Pricing: Plans start at $180 per year, which allows you to assess 15 candidates. This can get really expensive, really fast, if you hire large volumes of candidates.

9. Glider AI

If you have a small team or want to free yourself from busy work, you can let AI take care of the bulk of the work with Glider AI, a hiring tool that uses AI chatbots to interact with candidates, ask them questions, have phone screening interviews, and much more.

Pricing: Unfortunately, pricing is not publicly available on the Glider website. Reviews from Capterra note that a free trial and a free plan are available, with paid plans starting at $299/month.

10. Harver

Harver helps hiring teams create a full-funnel hiring process — from testing to interviewing, reference checks, and everything in between. One of the coolest things about this platform is that it’s available in 29 languages. Harver claims that 31 psychologists evaluate the skills tests before they go live.

Pricing: You can book a demo to learn about Harver’s pricing, but online sources state that you can expect a cost of up to $5,000/month.

11. Bryq

Bryq states that they can help you improve your quality of hire by 81%, reduce your time to hire by 51%, and get you a 119% boost in DEI. The process is unique in that you start with your own employee performance or existing job roles and, using the AI builder, create assessments in minutes.

To help find the best talent, Bryq uses a chatbot-style assessment that is easy for the candidate and feels more like a conversation. However, this means there are no soft skills tests (such as overt integrity tests), just job-related tests specific to a role.

Pricing: You have to get a demo to learn how much Bryq costs.

12. Canditech

Use Canditech to test everything from soft and hard skills to job-related skills for roles both technical and non-technical. Unlike many other tools on this list, Canditech promises an all-in-one screening platform to help you go from hundreds of applicants to making an offer quickly.

Pricing: Perhaps the biggest drawback is that many of the best features are locked in higher pricing plans. The basic package starts at $90/month for one assessment, but if you want an ATS integration, it’ll set you back $200/month.

13. HR Avatar

Grab one of the 400+ available tests in HR Avatar to assess candidates’ job-related hard and soft skills. With this tool, you can create not only custom tests but also custom video interview scripts.

Once you’re done shortlisting, you can perform reference checks and video interviews, all within the same software. While those features are great, users complain the platform is hard to use and buggy at times.

Pricing: Plans start at $50 for just one candidate, making this a very expensive choice for teams hiring at scale.

14. Pymetrics

If you have the technical part of talent assessment sorted, Pymetrics can help you assess soft skills. This AI-powered app uses complex soft skills tests to determine if a candidate is the right fit for you — aka, whether they’ll vibe with the company culture and play well with your existing employees.

Pricing: Public pricing isn’t available, and the company has a one-star rating on Capterra for “value for money.”

15. ThriveMap

Categorized as a “pre-hiring tool,” ThriveMap helps businesses fight employee attrition. It’s designed specifically to help you build realistic job previews and create a “day-in-the-life” experience for your applicants.

While helpful for various aspects of candidate assessment and pre-employment screening, if you’re looking for personality tests, cognitive ability tests, or anything similar, ThriveMap isn’t the best choice.

Pricing: Public pricing isn’t available, but the company’s pricing page says its plans are “tailored to your hiring requirements and objectives.”

16. Test Invite

Create personality tests, language tests, aptitude tests, and more with Test Invite. What’s cool about this platform is that you can create your own bank of questions to personalize your skills assessment tests for your roles and business goals.

Aside from basic skills testing tools, Test Invite offers pretty basic features and doesn’t offer many types of templates to choose from. Their anti-cheating measures include webcam recording, screen recording, browser lock, and more. While that may sound attractive, it could scare more candidates off than attract them.

Pricing: Plans start at $37.50 per month.

What to look for when choosing a candidate assessment tool

With this list of pre-employment assessment tools in front of you, you might be confused as to which is best. After all, they all offer pre-employment assessment capabilities, right? True, yeah. But here are some features any great assessment tool should have.

Extensive skills test library

You shouldn’t have to create your own pre-employment tests from scratch. Great hiring tools come with a library of different hard skills, soft skills, and personality tests custom-built for various roles that you can grab right off the shelf and adapt to your needs.

Time-saving automation

What’s the point of choosing a new hiring tool if you can’t connect it to the rest of your recruitment technology stack? Any truly great tool should come with an ATS integration, recruiting CRM integration, video interview tools, and more.

Anti-cheating measures

As you can see, many tools on this list have anti-cheating measures, and they’re becoming increasingly important in the digital business world. Companies that want the best candidates should use tools with built-in anti-cheating measures so applicants can’t copy and paste answers just to boost their scores.

Anti-AI measures

AI is helpful for most modern-day jobs, but ideally, candidates should show their own knowledge and ability and not that of ChatGPT. Great assessment tools have built-in features that can recognize if the content is AI-generated.

Reporting capabilities

Once the assessments roll in, your hiring team should be able to generate a report with the top-performing candidates and their results. At a glance, reports allow you to see overall performance and how the majority of applicants performed.

How to incorporate talent assessment tools into the hiring process

Pre-employment testing is usually just one part of the recruitment process. Once you’ve chosen the right tool for the job, you need to ensure it works with the rest of your tool stack. Here’s how to do just that.

Application screening

Go from 100 to 10 candidates by using talent assessment tools. Set your test score threshold and automatically push top-scoring candidates through to the next round.

Video interviews

Talk to candidates before they reach the interview stage to make better hiring decisions. With pre-recorded video interviews, you can see what the candidate’s communication style and skills are like without having to schedule a separate interview or call.

Final selection

Use pre-employment tests as guidelines to help with your hiring decisions. If you’re considering more than one candidate, consider their soft skills or personality test results before making the final call.

Start making data-driven hiring decisions

Candidate assessment tools are one of the quickest ways to improve hiring for everyone, from the candidates and your hiring team to your boss (who will definitely care about whether you made a good hire and how that impacts the business’s bottom line).

Improve the candidate experience, make better hiring decisions, and move your hiring process to the 21st century by choosing the right tool — Toggl Hire. We might be a little biased, but using our candidate assessment features, your hiring decisions won’t be.

Start using Toggl Hire today completely free and take advantage of our custom-built assessment templates.

What good is a journey without a destination? Sure, you might get to see a few things and go for a ride, but ultimately, the destination is the purpose.

This is one of the key principles in Stephen R. Covey’s influential book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. It relates to his second habit, “Begin with the End in Mind.” The premise is that with a clear goal and purpose, you can define and tackle actions that will help you reach that goal. In other words, you stop wandering aimlessly and get a clear sense of direction.

Today, we’ll explain what “begin with the end in mind” means in practical terms and how you can live this motto, too.

TL;DR — Key Takeaways

• The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People is a book by Stephen R. Covey where he outlines how to become more efficient in your personal and professional life.
• To begin with the end in mind means to envision a clear goal before starting so you can find out which steps to take to reach your destination.
• To effectively begin with the end in mind, first understand the end result, write a personal mission statement, and use SMART goals.
• The remaining six habits tie into the second one by forcing you to consider the small steps that build your path to the overarching end goal.

First…what are The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People?

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, published in 2004, is a popular book by Stephen R. Covey. For the past 20+ years, it’s been a popular resource for anyone who wants to solve problems in their own life, whether professional or personal.

1. Be proactive. Take responsibility for your actions instead of blaming external circumstances. You’re in charge of your own life and shape it by making conscious choices. The idea is to act first before being acted upon.
2. Begin with the end in mind. Define a clear end goal to work toward so you live purposefully and prioritize actions that make a difference.
3. Put first things first. Prioritize tasks based on importance instead of urgency. Carefully choose those tasks that align with your long-term goals.
4. Think win-win. In relationships, look for situations where every party involved can benefit somehow. This fosters collaboration, trust, and shared success.
5. Seek first to understand, then to be understood. Lead with empathy, igniting your active listening skills and thinking carefully before you respond.
6. Synergize. As a team, you can achieve more than an individual.
7. Sharpen the saw. Invest in becoming a better version of yourself physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. Practice these habits day-to-day, as it’s the only way to stay resilient and continue growing.

What does it mean to begin with the end in mind?

The second habit is arguably the most important for those who seek to reach their goals more quickly and easily. Once you envision a clear goal you want to achieve, you can create blueprints for specific actions necessary to get there.

For example, your end goal is to save $10,000 in 2025. To achieve it, you need to:

• Create an annual and monthly budget
• Determine how much you want to save and stick to it
• Set aside a certain portion of your monthly income
• Ask for a raise at your current job
• Find side gigs to earn X income per month

Covey’s second habit can be applied in professional and personal life and in a variety of situations, from something as life-altering as changing a career path to smaller things like choosing a new pair of sneakers.

This habit is powerful because it brings intentionality to decision-making. Making choices can be death by a thousand paper cuts. How often have you decided not to go anywhere because you don’t know what to wear?

Instead of wasting time making the right decision, the end goal dictates your choices. Distractions are minimal, and you can work faster since you have a clear vision of the outcome and you’re not bothered by making smaller decisions and milestones.

How to begin with the end in mind

Intentionality is excellent in theory, but many people struggle to apply it in real life. Below, we outlined some easy steps you can start with right now.

Understand the end result

Which of these two goals sounds easier to achieve?

1. Get fitter next year.
2. Lose 10kg by June 1. Be able to run five kilometers without significant difficulty. Have clean bloodwork by December 1.

The second goal is measurable, tangible, and easier to visualize.

Wanting “success” is one thing, but defining what that success means for you is crucial for effective goal-setting and crushing that goal. You’ll work toward the goal deliberately instead of shooting in the dark and hoping you hit something.

Write a personal mission statement

A personal mission statement is a short declaration of your purpose, values, and guiding principles. According to Covey, you can do this in just a few short steps.

• Reflect on your life’s purpose. Ask yourself questions such as “What do I want to accomplish in life (personally and professionally)? What values are most important to me? How do I want to be remembered by family, friends, colleagues, and my community?”
• Visualize your ideal life. Covey suggests imagining your own funeral or a significant event, such as a retirement party. Ask yourself what you would want others to think about, your biggest contributions, your roles in their lives (parent, leader, friend), and what legacy you want to leave.
• Define the roles you want to take on in life. For example, parent, partner, leader, mentor, and others. For each role, consider the principles you want to uphold and the goals to track.
• Identify your core values and principles. List the principles you want to live by, such as treating others with kindness. And notions such as compassion, integrity, growth, or creativity that resonate with you.
• Draft your mission statement. Combine all the items above into a cohesive and clear statement.

Use SMART goals

SMART goals can be applied everywhere. From crushing your KPIs at work to situations in the real world, such as paying off a car loan. SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound, which are the elements of every effective goal.

Here is what it looks like in practice:

• Specific: Save money for a downpayment for a house this year.
• Measurable: I need $50,000.
• Achievable: I can save an additional $500 monthly on regular expenses and pick up a side job or two to make another $500.
• Relevant: It supports my decision to become a homeowner by the age of 40 and pay off the property by retirement.
• Time-bound: Achieve by December 31, 2025.

When your goals are SMART, your vision becomes clearer, and you’re better aligned with the second habit. The same goes for whatever your goals are.

What about the other six habits of highly effective people?

All seven habits of highly effective people work together to help you become the best version of yourself.

• Be proactive sets the foundations for maximizing efficiency by encouraging you to take responsibility and control your choices instead of blaming others.
• Put first things first focuses on the end goal so you can ignore short-term pleasures. For example, avoiding distractions such as doomscrolling on social media to help you achieve the bigger goal and do proper deep work.
• Think win-win forces you to collaborate with people who align with your values and purpose. It emphasizes collaboration and trust, which are all necessary for habit two to work well.
• Seek first to understand is all about communication and understanding others. You must connect with others and gain support for your goals to begin with the end in mind.
• Synergize amplifies habit two by using teamwork and collaboration. When you combine diverse perspectives and talents, you can create new, better solutions as you work toward your goal.
• Sharpen the saw gives you the resilience, clarity, and energy to pursue your end goal continuously. When you take good care of yourself, you ensure you’re aligned with the purpose from habit two.

How Covey’s habits apply to project management

Like real life, Covey’s seven habits work equally well in project management. The second habit means starting with a specific and clear goal in mind so everyone on the team knows what success looks like.

For example, if you aim to launch a new feature that solves a pain point for a subset of your target audience, you can break it down into deliverables and milestones. Everyone on your team knows what success entails, which steps to achieve it, what the target audience expects, and, ideally, who takes on which part of the workload.

Other habits, such as “Think Win-Win,” tie in nicely with project management. For example, each team member can think about the best coworker or department to collaborate with to achieve said goal. In our case, product management collaborates with customer success to translate customers’ needs into story points to develop the new feature.

Franklin Covey’s advice on time management

When you begin with the end in mind, you envision the goal the moment you start, helping you carve out the steps to success.

Another key part of Covey’s framework is time, as described in Covey’s time management matrix. To master your time, you need to prioritize important but not urgent tasks and focus on your long-term goals. This minimizes distractions and ensures that whenever you work towards your goal, time is spent intentionally and meaningfully.

In other words, molding yourself to Covey’s second habit means nothing without efficiently managing your time. To crush your personal and professional goals and truly begin with the end in mind, start with the second habit to build a strong foundation.

And when you need help managing your time, sign up for a free Toggl Track account.

The numbers aren’t in for 2024 yet, but 2023 was a record-setting year. 1,914 CEOs left their positions, marking a 55% increase from the previous year.

But what would you do if your CEO resigned tomorrow? How would that impact your team’s strategy? Although you’d replace them eventually, the interim might be confusing, demotivating, and blisteringly unproductive.

Succession planning is how teams avoid this blurry interim. It allows organizations to maintain operational success during transition periods, as key employees leave and new leaders step up internally.

TL;DR — Key Takeaways

• Succession planning is a long-term strategy designed to prepare promising internal talent to fill key positions when senior leaders leave an organization.
• It is a highly collaborative operation coordinated by HR and senior leadership.
• Benefits of proper succession planning include business continuity, employee retention, organizational stability, and boosted morale.
• Build a great succession planning process by identifying key roles, candidates for succession, creating talent development plans, and monitoring program success over time.

What is succession planning?

Succession planning is the process of preparing people to take over critical roles in your organization so your business doesn’t lose momentum in the case of a planned or unplanned departure.

You know when your phone asks you to back up your data? It wants to ensure you don’t lose your important photos and files if your device crashes.

Businesses also “back up” important roles in the company by preparing people to eventually fill them. That’s succession planning in action. It keeps companies resilient and adaptable and avoids the vulnerabilities that arise from a lack of leadership or power vacuum (you remember Game of Thrones, right?)

Is HR in charge of succession planning?

HR works in collaboration with leadership to outline and execute a succession plan. HR builds the scaffolding, providing the necessary structure and tools. Leadership drives the vision and execution.

HR’s responsibilities may include:

• Identifying candidates for succession
• Building and implementing talent plans
• Measuring progress and providing regular feedback
• Instilling a culture of career development for all employees

Leadership’s responsibilities may include:

• Determining the strategic direction and future needs of the organization
• Identifying the organization’s critical positions and the skills required to succeed in those roles
• Priming employees to commit to their personal and professional development

The benefits of effective succession planning

49% of businesses consider succession planning a top priority. With all this talk we’ve been hearing of a talent shortage recently, it makes sense to retain top talent wherever you can, and an effective succession plan is a key part of that.

Here are the specific benefits you can expect when you commit to this process.

Ensure business continuity

If your marketing assistant quits, chances are you can replace them pretty quickly and easily. Even if you don’t, it’s probably not going to affect your bottom line immensely. But your Director of Marketing is a different story. Leaving key vacancies open could lead to downtime, inefficient operations, lost opportunities, internal turmoil, confusion, and instability.

Grow and retain high-potential talent

Growth opportunities are one of the most important factors in an employee’s decision to stay with a business. This is even more pronounced in Gen Z workers, who value progression 36% more than other generations.

If you want to retain your high-potential employees, offering talent development programs could be the way to go. They help employees build skills and confidence through mentorship, training, and growth opportunities. They also help managers separate the wheat from the chaff, those who are intrinsically motivated and those who aren’t.

Improve employee engagement and retention

Showcasing long-term opportunities can build trust and motivation among your employees. The second-most common reason for quitting a job (behind pay)? Lack of advancement, development, or career opportunities.

Organizations have picked up on this. With 90% of companies concerned about employee retention, a 2024 LinkedIn report found learning opportunities to be the best retention strategy for talent. Encourage a culture of career reflection and projection among your employees. This will help you understand their aspirations and better position you to support them along their career path.

Facilitate knowledge transfer

When you lose someone in your business, you lose the invisible frameworks they created in their heads: the speed with which they can find what they need, the creative solutions they crafted to access different dashboards, and the efficiencies that come with working with the same tool stack day in and day out.

No matter how skilled the next person is, there will be a ramp-up period where they get accustomed to the set-up of the Drive folder or the naming system in Hubspot.

While this kind of knowledge might just be the cost of a role transition, other kinds of knowledge transfer can be systematized. Mentoring relationships or training plans can reduce skills gaps during transitions by systematically documenting knowledge sharing and creating repeatable and scalable plans that ensure employees are equipped with the necessary skill sets to succeed in new roles.

Achieving organizational stability

Failing to prepare is preparing to fail. Being proactive about your succession planning creates a more resilient company — one that doesn’t stumble in the face of crisis or change.

Stability protects operations and also creates a culture of confidence and adaptability. As a result, companies are better positioned to innovate and lead in their industry. After all, how you do one thing is how you do everything. So, companies proactive about succession planning are likely also proactive about jumping on new opportunities as they arise.

The risks of avoiding succession planning

Neglecting succession planning can lead to all sorts of undesirable outcomes:

• Delayed decision-making: The loss of a leader in key positions can create a leadership vacuum, where it becomes unclear who’s calling the shots. This can delay important decision-making, and result in operational inefficiencies.
• Loss of top talent: Turbulent times can tank employee morale, leading even your best performers to leave, or at least consider it.
• Increase in recruitment costs: A hasty recruitment campaign to replace the lost leader can take a lot longer than replacing them internally with a strong succession plan. This increases recruitment costs, time to hire, and can even impact quality of hire if decisions are made rashly.
• Uncertainty and confusion: Without a clear succession plan, confusion and fear can easily spread among employees. This can cause further conflict, miscommunication, and power struggles.

Let’s take the example of Blackberry. Thorsten Heins stepped down as CEO in 2013 after six years at the company. He passed the baton to John Chen, a veteran Silicon Valley executive. However, a messy succession plan resulted in the termination of 4,500 employees and a net loss of nearly $1 billion.

Don’t be Blackberry. Plan accordingly.

How to build a great succession planning process

Getting started with succession planning can feel overwhelming, which is why we’ve broken it down into a step-by-step process for you. Remember to tailor your succession planning strategy to your business’s needs and developmental goals.

Step 1: Identify critical roles

Not all roles are suitable for succession planning. Focus on leadership positions or roles requiring specialized skills. You’ll need to outline the core competencies of these roles — both hard and soft skills.

It can be useful to standardize the criteria you use to identify these roles, such as operational impact, strategic influence, or urgency to fill.

Step 2: Assess current talent

Next, you’ll want to analyze your current talent pool to identify high-potential employees who could be molded into future senior leaders. Several tools are available here, including skills gap analysis, employee evaluations, or 360-degree feedback from performance reviews.

Step 3: Pinpoint high-potential employees

Not all high-potential employees are made the same, but here are some common-denominator traits to look for in internal talent:

• Consistently high performing
• High emotional intelligence and soft skills, indicating leadership potential
• Adaptability in the face of new challenges
• Drive and ambition — consistently seeking out learning opportunities, mentorship, and growth
• Cultural fit — deeply aligned with the company’s vision, values, and mission

You can also use something like a 9-box grid to map out traits and performance.

Draw up a successor profile that includes their strengths, weaknesses, skills, experience, and career goals. This will serve as a baseline for step 4.

Step 4: Develop personalized growth plans

By understanding where your potential successors are now, you’ll effectively chart a path to where you need them to be. Outline an individual development plan to support their growth.

This is the “action plan” of the succession planning process and should clearly specify development activities and milestones designed to bridge any skills gaps identified during the assessment phase.

These activities may include training programs, mentorship, or job rotations, but they should always be tailored to the employee’s needs.

Step 5: Transfer knowledge effectively

By that, we mean systematize everything. Succession planning is such a resource-heavy activity that it doesn’t make sense to repeat actions you can automate. Build in some standard documentation practices and mentoring curricula to keep institutional knowledge flowing smoothly to future leaders. Ideally, they should cover knowledge transfer of both hard and soft skills.

Step 6: Align with corporate strategy

Succession planning should directly reflect the company’s vision for long-term success. When selecting and developing future leadership, keep future market or industry demands in mind. For example, you might equip the next generation with in-depth generative AI training or cultural sensitivity workshops to navigate an increasingly global and remote workforce.

Step 7: Monitor and measure progress

Check in regularly on your succession plan’s performance. Set up some KPIs — like tracking promotions, leadership readiness, number of successors per key roles, and retention rates.

For example, this could look like:

• Enhance succession readiness: Within six months, identify at least three qualified successors for each critical role, creating a solid talent pipeline.
• Reduce time-to-fill: Decrease the average time-to-fill by 20% over the next year for key roles.
• Improve employee engagement scores: Boost employee engagement by 15% in the next annual survey.

Step 8: Reassess and adapt regularly

Make iterative improvements a natural part of your performance management strategy. This will help you account for industry changes and company growth. Staying flexible is the key to remaining relevant to team members, development opportunities, and leadership skills.

Step 9: Get buy-in from leadership

Succession planning without buy-in from senior stakeholders will fall flat. They need to be engaged in the process, offering input and support to maintain the plan once it has launched.

Get leadership involved early on. Hook them by speaking their language — reduced risks, stronger leadership teams, and how streamlining this process will hit their strategic goals. Ask for their input during key stages, like development planning and successor selection, to get their skin in the game.

Step 10: Invest in the right tools

Delegate as much heavy lifting as you can to succession planning tools. Career path templates, performance management tools, or talent development software can take a load of manual, repetitive tasks off your plate. They save time, identify potential leaders, track progress, and provide development opportunities while offering better team insights.

Tips for getting succession planning right (and mistakes to avoid)

There’s no such thing as one-size-fits-all succession planning. But there are some best practices you should follow.

Pair succession planning with talent management

Merging succession planning with other talent management initiatives like leadership development can create a cohesive employee experience.

For example, this might look like an ambitious marketing manager who has participated in various leadership development programs over the years, such as communication skills, assertiveness training, and mentorship from the Global VP of Marketing.

When a more senior role opens up, this marketing manager is named as a potential candidate for succession. Preparing them for the role won’t be such a jump since they’ve been “studying” it for years already.

Use a succession planning template

As a human resources leader, a succession plan is a continuous process, so create a template for it as you iterate on it over months or years. This will save you time while standardizing the succession process and ensuring no details are overlooked.

Think long-term

Don’t just project the next 1-3 years — think 5-10 years ahead. Like a soccer club that replaces outgoing players with their own trainees, invest in employee development, and stay in the loop about any emerging technologies. This prepares your team, ensuring they’re ready to take the field when opportunities arise.

Measure the right succession planning metrics

You can’t improve what you don’t measure. Tracking metrics like retention rates, engagement scores, and promotion readiness can identify strengths and weaknesses in your succession plan. Average employee tenure, voluntary turnover rate, and Employee Net Promoter scores are a good place to start.

Hire top talent for successful workforce planning

A good succession plan starts at the hiring stage. Hire people who add strategic, long-term value to your company. Solid external recruiting efforts will make succession planning easier and smoother. After all, the best leadership pipelines include a balance of external hires and internal promotions.

Asana is one of the world’s most popular project management tools, complete with flying unicorns and other celebration creatures that whizz across the screen as you blitz through your to-do list.

More than 150,000 organizations worldwide use Asana to manage their workload, improve efficiency and profitability, and delight customers. And what better way to influence all of those things than tracking time?

Asana added a built-in time tracker to its software in 2022, allowing users to add time entries for tasks and projects. A few years on, the dust has settled, and we’re asking — is it any good? Or….should you use external time trackers for Asana tasks instead? Our quick guide helps you decide for yourself.

TL;DR — Key Takeaways

• Asana is a project management platform with a native time tracking app and integrations with third-party time tracking platforms.
• The native Asana time tracking features are limited and only allow manual time entry, which can cause issues with accuracy and reporting. They are also only available in the Advanced plan at $24.99 per user/mo.
• A large selection of third-party time tracking apps sync with Asana, such as Toggl Track, Everhour, Hubstaff, Clockify, and Harvest. Some are free, some are paid, and all offer extended functionality compared to the native Asana app.
• Toggl Track is the best way to track time in Asana because of its ease of use, detailed reporting, customizable workflows, two-way data sync, and affordable pricing plans.

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Disclaimer: This is our app. With over 5 million users across 120 countries and 1,500 reviews on G2 alone, we believe we’re one of the best time tracking apps out there. We hope you do, too!

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Understanding Asana’s native time tracking features

To activate time tracking in Asana, head to a new project in your dashboard and click “Customize.” You can then add a custom field for the project. You want to choose two options:

• Estimated time
• Actual time

These fields will now appear on each task and subtask within that project.

In the “Estimated time” field, you enter how much time you think a task will take in hours and minutes. In the “Actual time” field, you manually enter how much time a task took.

Users can retroactively fill in how much time they worked on a task. But this causes several problems.

First, there is a lot of guesstimation, and the users typically don’t add the precise time they spent working on something. When you bill clients at $200/hour, a few minutes daily can make a significant difference every month.

Second, adopting this feature can be very slow because this time tracking method isn’t very intuitive. It can be difficult to get employees to track their time this way.

Because of these issues, the reports you produce will rarely be accurate. While it may fit the bill for basic internal time tracking, it won’t meet the standards of many clients and companies requiring more detailed, customized reports.

Perhaps the biggest issue is these time tracking features are only available in the Advanced Asana plan, which costs $24.99 per user/mo, when billed annually.

Advantages and limitations of Asana’s native timer

Asana’s native timer may be good enough for users who require basic time-tracking capabilities. Here are some of its primary advantages and disadvantages.

✅ Pros	❌ Cons
• Ease of use • Seamless integration with other Asana features • Cost-effectiveness (if you are already on the Advanced plan)	• Potential issues with entering time manually • The lack of advanced reports (especially for service providers, as one reviewer states) • No customization options

In short, Asana is a project management app with a time tracking add-on rather than a standalone time tracking app. As such, the native integration covers the basics well, but don’t expect advanced features.

The best time tracking apps to integrate with Asana

While Asana is an exceptional project management app with some native time tracking features, it wasn’t purposely built for time tracking. For advanced users, the native function for Asana projects may lack features for advanced time tracking.

The great news is that due to Asana’s popularity, there are many integrations with dedicated time tracking platforms. Here are some of the best Asana integrations for time tracking you can try in 2025, complete with our personal review of each.

Toggl Track

Toggl Track offers two ways to integrate with Asana. The native integration is available to free users of both apps and allows you to track time for tasks and projects in Asana. To import data from Asana to Toggl Track, you’ll need a paid Toggl Track plan.

Some of the key features of this integration include:

• Automatic data synchronization
• Detailed, fully customizable reporting
• Idle detection and Pomodoro timer
• Browser extensions for Chrome, Firefox and Edge
• Embedded timer

Everhour

Everhour has a robust integration with Asana that synchronizes information between the two apps. After quick installation, you’ll see Everhour controls embedded in the Asana interface.

Some of the key features for this integration include:

• Regular synchronization of data from and to Asana
• Custom reports with fields of your own choice
• Project budgeting
• One-click timesheets for all employees

Hubstaff

This time tracker comes with a free 14-day trial, during which you can check out the Asana integration for free. It comes with a large feature set, including but not limited to:

• 20+ different report types
• Setting project budgets and hourly limits
• Detailed overviews: apps most used, time spent on projects, and many other customizable reports
• Optional screenshots

Clockify

Clockify offers a generous free plan to explore its Asana integration. However, since Clockify’s sister company has a project management app, its integration is not as robust as some other competitors on this list. Features include:

• Native time tracking in Asana’s interface
• Browser, mobile, and desktop app support (you’ll start timers in one place and stop them someplace else)
• Time reports (but only in the web version of the app)

Harvest

Similarly to Clockify, the Asana integration for Harvest exists, but it’s not the most advanced. Some of your capabilities include:

• Tracking time directly from Asana with a Harvest button
• Importing projects and people from Asana to Harvest

Choosing the best time tracking solution for your needs

Not sure which time tracking platform to integrate with Asana? Here’s a step-by-step guide on what to keep in mind before purchasing.

The team size

If you want to track time in Asana with third-party integration, you’re purchasing a completely new tool. You should determine how many employees will track their time and what kind of pricing plan you fit into.

The project complexity

Depending on what you use your Asana account for, you’ll have different time tracking needs. For example, if you work in an in-house team, you may need a simple start-stop timer and straightforward time reports.

On the other hand, if you run an agency or work in a more complex environment, you may need timesheets, real-time insights on tasks and projects, additional invoicing tools, and more. Research the feature set of the time tracking app, and, ideally, try the free trial before committing.

Your reporting needs

Depending on who reads your time tracking reports, they’ll need different levels of detail. For example, a simple breakdown of time entries may be enough for a manager who wants a high-level overview of ongoing tasks.

On the other hand, an enterprise or agency client needs time tracking with more granularity, such as tasks and subtasks, a breakdown of billable hours, the type of work done, and more.

The browser extension options

If you work on many tasks daily, jumping back and forth between windows and apps can, ironically, be time-consuming. This is why most good time tracking platforms come with browser extensions. You can start and stop the timer in the browser and choose what type of task you’re tracking time for.

For example, Toggl Track has a browser extension for Chrome, Firefox, and Edge. The installation takes just a few minutes, and you can start using both apps in sync (we’ll even walk you through how to do just that below!).

Practical tips for time tracking in Asana

If you already use Asana and want to make your workflows even better with time tracking, we have some practical advice for everyone, from beginners to pros.

Set up time tracking properly in the native app

When using the native Asana time tracking app, click on “Customize” in the top right corner of a task and choose “Time tracking.” This lets you add “Estimated time” and “Actual time” as a custom field for each task.

Monitor your progress

Regularly compare the estimated and actual times for your tasks. This lets you see if your predictions are off and allows you to make more accurate predictions in the future. As a result, you become better at quoting potential clients, and you avoid scope creep.

Provide training before starting

Your team members may be experts at project and task management in Asana, but they could be new to tracking time.

First, explain the value of time tracking. Most importantly, explain that you’re doing it to increase efficiency and productivity and not to spy and micromanage.

Then walk the team through the integration. Cover how it works, where they can find the reports, who else reads them, and how the learnings will be used for task and work management.

Stay consistent with time tracking

Time tracking only works if it becomes a second-nature habit for your team. Encourage your team to track their time for all types of tasks, from the moment they turn on their devices until they log off.

This lets you find patterns, distinguish between billable and non-billable hours, bill clients more accurately, and much more. If someone on your team forgets to track their time, adding hours manually later on is fairly easy, whether with the native Asana app or integration.

Toggl Track 🤝 Asana

Toggl Track’s integration with Asana is completely free, and you can try it out with a free account on both platforms. It comes with a host of other benefits compared to the native Asana time tracking app.

It’s easy to use, and the reporting capabilities are much more advanced. Toggl Track isn’t just a great fit for Asana, either. It also supports other project management apps such as Trello, Todoist, and Jira, as well as 100+ other online apps.

The bottom line? Asana and Toggl Track are great apps on their own, but combined, they can increase your productivity, efficiency, and profitability.

Sign up for a free Toggl Track account today to see the two apps in action. If you need help setting up the Asana and Toggl Track integration, just follow the instructions below!

Tracking time in Asana with the Toggl Track web app

This is the first of two ways to track time in Asana with Toggl Track. It shouldn’t take more than 60 seconds to get up and running!

1. Create a free Toggl Track account

Head over to Toggl Track and sign up for your free account.

2. Go to the integrations page

Log in to your account and go to the Integrations page in the side menu.

3. Enable the Asana integration

Scroll down to the list of native integrations and click ‘Get started’ next to Asana.

Click the ‘Enable’ button.

4. Log in to your Asana account

Once you’ve clicked enable, you will be asked to log in to your Asana account.

Click ‘Allow’ once you’ve signed in.

Head back to Toggl Track and click on the “Sync Now” button to manually sync users, projects, and tasks to keep your data in Toggl Track up to date. This will push all of your Asana projects and tasks into Toggl Track.

5. Start tracking with Asana

You can then quickly start tracking time on any task within a project right inside Toggl Track.

Tracking time in Asana with the Toggl Track Chrome extension

Toggl Track’s free browser extensions embed a Toggl Track timer into the interface of more than 100 apps, allowing you to track time within the app itself.

With additional features like a pomodoro timer and idle detection, it’s the ultimate tool for maximizing productivity and streamlining time tracking into your workflow without needing to jump between tools. Here’s how you can start tracking time in Asana with it.

Note: This is the exact step-by-step guide for our Firefox add-on.

1. Install the Toggl Track chrome extension

Head to the Chrome web store and add the Toggl Track Chrome extension to your browser. Note that you may be asked to log in to your Toggl Track account.

2. Enable the Asana time tracking integration

Click on the Chrome extension in your browser and then click on the settings icon.

Navigate to the ‘Integrations’ page, check the box next to ‘Asana – app.asana.com,’ and allow access.

3. Start tracking time in Asana

Head over to your Asana dashboard and hit refresh. You should now notice a small Toggl Track icon next to your tasks in Asana.

Click the icon, and a Toggl Track pop-up will appear. Your task name will become the time entry description in Toggl Track, and the project will automatically be filled. The example below shows that ‘SEO Campaign’ is the project.

This will start the timer in Toggl Track straight away. Want to stop the timer for any given task? You have two options.

The first is to click the Toggl Track icon in your dashboard. This will stop the timer instantly for that task.

Or, hit the stop button within the Toggl Track Chrome extension.

It’s as simple as that! Remember, if you don’t have an account already, it’s free to get started with both Toggl Track and Asana. If you have other questions about time tracking integrations or how Toggl Track integrates with other software, check out the Toggl Community.

Time tracking gets a bad rap — and honestly, it’s easy to see why.

When misused or poorly implemented, it can feel like micromanagement at its worst, creating frustration and distrust among employees. No wonder so many people cringe at the thought of tracking their time.

But here’s the thing…time tracking itself isn’t the villain. When done right, it’s a powerful tool for fostering productivity, fairness, and balance in the workplace. The secret lies in avoiding the common pitfalls that can turn it into a nightmare.

Understanding where it goes wrong and how to address those issues can bring clarity, efficiency, and fairness to your workplace. Here’s how to do just that.

Why is time tracking bad in some cases?

We might ruffle some feathers with this, but it’s honestly only bad when you use it as a tool to spy on employees. Toggl takes a pretty strong anti-surveillance stance, and several problems can arise from improper implementation.

Simply put, the way certain businesses capture and use time data is what’s problematic. Some are downright outdated and silly. For example, paper timesheets and manual time tracking on an Excel spreadsheet are tedious and error-prone. They can turn time data collection into a thankless chore.

There are many reasons why time tracking goes bad, like data misuse, micromanagement, lacking support, and technical issues. Let’s take a look at some of the top cases in more detail. 👇

1. Micromanagement and overemphasis on productivity

Time tracking is a great tool for seeing how your employees spend their time during the workday. However, when people managers use time data and employee surveillance features to monitor their employees excessively, creativity is stifled.

It also fosters distrust and a lack of autonomy, leading to increased stress and reduced morale. Furthermore, monitoring employee activity isn’t a good gauge of productivity, as appearing busy is not the same as being productive.

Instead, focus on results and output and track time to understand how long tasks and projects take to complete. This will give you valuable data to improve your project management processes.

Inflexibility

Strict time tracking rules make it difficult for employees to have agency over their time management. They are forced to stick to certain work hours, which is especially restrictive for those in roles that require creative thinking and problem-solving.

These roles also suffer when employee surveillance features that monitor computer activity are utilized. Employees may appear inactive while working through a problem in their heads or on paper. 

Allow employees to work flexible hours to avoid inflexibility killing productivity and morale. This enables employees to manage their time and get work done when they’re most productive. It also benefits working parents, team members with health conditions, and student employees.

Stress and burnout

Employees who are constantly monitored report worse mental health, higher levels of tension and stress, and more cases of the workplace negatively impacting or harming their mental health.

Rigid time tracking also leads to employees padding their time entries by falsifying the data or remaining at their desks, faking busyness after completing tasks. This negates any benefit of gathering time data as it is inaccurate. Plus, the employees could be spending this time on other things.

Regularly check in with your employees about workloads and stress levels and offer mental health support and resources. Create a safe space for employees to reach out if they are struggling.

Promote a healthy work-life balance and discourage working overtime. Employees shouldn’t feel they must conform to hustle culture to be seen as good employees.

Overemphasis on quantity over quality

When managers focus solely on the amount of time spent on work instead of the quality, they encourage bad, inefficient work habits that contribute to reduced productivity.

Encouraging a results-oriented work environment by setting clear quality benchmarks and key performance indicators allows employees to take their time and ensure the highest quality of work.

Implementing this strategy alongside reasonable time tracking metrics lets you balance quality and quantity. Ensure you regularly review and adjust your metrics to align with goals.

2. Privacy, trust, and legal concerns

Time tracking tools with activity monitoring and employee surveillance features invade personal privacy as they can capture personal data by monitoring non-work activities. 

They also foster a feeling of distrust between employees and management, contributing to a hostile work environment. At worst, employee monitoring tools can lead to legal issues when sensitive data is captured.

Here are some more details about these issues and how to avoid them.

Lack of trust

Excessively tracking and monitoring your employees damages trust and employee morale and creates a toxic work culture. This eventually contributes to increased employee turnover and difficulty retaining talent.

Instead, opt for a non-invasive employee time tracking solution like Toggl Track and involve employees in the decision-making process when creating time tracking policies.

Be transparent and regularly communicate about time tracking, the benefits, and best practices to build trust and get everyone on board.

Misuse of data

The benefits of time tracking are severely diminished if your management team doesn’t know what to do with the data, misinterprets it, or uses it for the wrong purposes.

Data misinterpretation or misuse can result in unfair performance evaluations, incorrect conclusions, and biased decisions, so ensure your managers are trained in ethical data usage and interpretation 

Regularly auditing time tracking practices and data usage and implementing checks and balances helps ensure fairness and accuracy across the board.

Legal and compliance issues

Some methods of employee monitoring and data collection are illegal in certain jurisdictions or require strict disclosures and prior consent. Implementing a time tracking system can be a minefield, especially with globally distributed remote teams.

To stay on the right side of labor law and regulations, consult with a legal expert to ensure all time tracking software, practices, and policies are compliant.

3. Inappropriate application and one-size-fits-all approach

Failing to consider the unique needs and workflows of the different teams and roles that make up your organization and using a standardized time tracking method can result in employee dissatisfaction and inaccurate time data. Here are a few key issues to avoid.

Lack of customization

Time tracking systems without customization features are non-inclusive and may not meet the specific needs of different roles, projects, and individuals. This can hinder time tracking adoption and lead to inaccurate data and frustration on both sides.

Opt instead for customizable time tracking software. Work with your staff to tailor the system to their requirements. Continually review and improve the system to ensure it fits various projects and tasks.

Failure to align with company culture

A time tracking tool that doesn’t align with company culture and values can result in resistance and a lack of employee engagement.

Bring employees into the discussion around time tracking and ask them to help develop and refine time tracking practices. This will help promote a positive view of time tracking as a tool for growth and improvement, not micromanagement and control.

Technical issues

A poorly implemented time tracking system that doesn’t properly integrate with the existing tools in a tech stack can be prone to errors and glitches that cause frustration and inefficiency. When this goes unresolved, it slows productivity down.

Ensure the time tracking software you choose is reliable and user-friendly. Do your research and look at reviews from real customers to give you a better idea of how the tool works and if it’s a good fit for your business.

Train and update your staff regularly on the time tracking system, and have a dedicated support team to tackle any technical issues that arise promptly.

4. Lack of training and support

As with any new tool or system, employees may struggle with time tracking if they’re not adequately trained. This can result in misuse or underuse of the system and even complete failure to track work time.

Misunderstanding of purpose

Employees may be less likely to use it correctly if they don’t understand the benefits and purpose of tracking time. Improper use of time tracking tools skews the data and results in inefficiencies.

To ensure your employees record accurate time entries, communicate the reasons and benefits clearly. Provide examples of time tracking benefits for the employee and company, like increased profitability, improved work-life balance, and better management of future projects.

Resistance to change

Any kind of change in business can be met with resistance if not properly managed, which makes proper implementation of new systems like time tracking tools much harder.

To avoid this becoming a bigger issue, ensure you have a thoroughly thought-out change-management strategy to ease the transition. Involve employees in the process and address their concerns openly as they arise.

This is another opportunity to reinforce the benefits of effective time tracking and mention any success stories other similar companies or teams have had in implementing time tracking.

Lack of ongoing support

Offering one-time training is not enough. Companies that fail to provide continuous support and resources may find their staff struggling to track their time effectively.

Creating a feedback loop helps ensure continuous improvement based on user experience, and establishing a dedicated support team helps address issues quickly so they don’t fester. 

So…is time tracking good or bad?

Time tracking is a great process to implement as long as it’s implemented correctly. It has many benefits for employers and employees, so it’s worth taking the time to research and ensure you use it properly.

Benefits of time tracking

• Increased employee productivity: Time tracking provides visibility into how work time is spent, identifies areas of inefficiency, and spots problem workflows that can be improved. 
• Accurate project estimates: Managers can more accurately estimate time for future projects when they can access time data from past projects, removing much of the guesswork. 
• Better resource management and allocation: With a clear overview of how time and skills are distributed across tasks and projects, resource allocation can be optimized to ensure team members aren’t over- or under-used.
• Improved billing and client management: Tracking billable hours can help justify costs by providing a transparent record of the time spent on client work.
• Reduced bottlenecks and time sinks: Time tracking makes it easy to spot tasks that take too much time so they can be addressed.

Tracking time with Toggl Track is good!

At the end of the day, whether or not time tracking is good comes down to the way it’s used. It’s important to choose and implement a time tracking tool that works for your business properly to avoid problems such as technical issues, misunderstandings, compliance queries, and inflexibility.

Toggl Track is a non-invasive employee time tracking tool that is user-friendly and easy to onboard. Sign up for Toggl Track for free today and start tracking employee time correctly.

Imagine standing at the start line of a marathon without fully understanding what you’ve committed to or what is required to complete the race.

You didn’t know you were required to train the distance, invest in a strong pair of running shoes, or pack energy gels to fuel your body and keep going. Perhaps it’s even a surprise that a marathon is 26.2 miles long!

Basically…you haven’t completed the prep work required to succeed in this challenge, and honestly, you might not make it to the finish line. Sounds stressful, right?

While business projects aren’t usually as physical as the average marathon, they rely on the same “requirements gathering” process to set companies up for success.

This guide will teach you how to collect requirements for a project, including when and who is involved. By following these steps, you’ll control project costs, stay on schedule, and deliver a successful project you and your team are happy with.

What is requirements gathering in project management?

Project management requirements gathering is the process of understanding every requirement involved in completing your project successfully. These “requirements” translate as all the tasks or resources you need to deliver the project on time, within budget and scope, and that meets (or ideally, exceeds) expectations.

While that probably sounds like a lot, requirements usually fall into two buckets:

• Business requirements: This is essentially the overall goal of your project
• Technical requirements: Everything involved in accomplishing the goal above

💡 Example: A marketing project’s business requirements may be to “increase leads by 20%.” The technical requirements include completing tasks to deliver items such as social ads and lead magnets to target customers with special offers.

Why is gathering project requirements so important?

Gathering project requirements is one of the most critical processes in a project’s lifecycle. 35% of failed projects cite inaccurate requirements gathering as the primary cause of failure. Don’t be part of this statistic.

Project progress requirements will help you to:

• Understand the scope of work
• Identify and assess all project risks
• Accurately estimate the cost of the project
• Create a project timeline everyone is happy with
• Effectively allocate and prioritize project resources 
• Not obliterate the project budget on irrelevant “requirements.” 

To stay organized as you grow and juggle projects, you must build a process that collects, translates, and shares requirements with the team to get it right every time.

The three main phases of requirements gathering

Requirements gathering happens in three broad phases.

Requirements elicitation

Requirements elicitation happens first. This initial phase gathers information to understand what stakeholders need, both during and from the project outcome. This step requires strong and open communication and proper investigation to check every requirement you “think” you need actually aligns with your business objectives.

Requirements documentation

The next step is to document the requirements to make them formal. You’re effectively putting a stake in the ground and announcing, “Hey, these are our non-negotiables.”

Documentation typically includes detailed descriptions of your business and technical requirements, but above all else, they must be accessible. After all, what’s the point of writing your requirements down if no one understands what they mean?

Requirements confirmation

In the final phase, key stakeholders will review, validate, and approve the requirements you’ve gathered. They’ll check that the requirements accurately reflect the stakeholders’ needs, are achievable within project constraints, and align with the organization’s overarching goals.

Be warned…there may be some discrepancies at this stage. Some stakeholders could disagree with others about the importance of certain requirements. Overcome this by using a recipe of negotiation, prioritization, and feasibility assessments to finalize your list of requirements.

How to gather requirements for a project

You can break each of the phases above into actionable steps. It’s worth pointing out that all projects differ, so there is no “best” way to gather them. But the list of steps below is a fantastic starting point.

Step 1. Decide when to gather project requirements 

Typically, you’ll gather the requirements right at the beginning during the project planning phase, allowing you to include them in your project brief and kick-off meeting. Deciding how much time to set aside for this is like asking how long a piece of string is. The size and complexity of the project and the availability of stakeholders will influence how straightforward this is.

Step 2. Assign roles to collect project requirements

The person or team responsible for gathering requirements will vary depending on your business and team size:

• Freelancer? That’s on you
• A small business? Potentially the founder or CEO
• Growing company? An Agile team project lead, account manager, or business analyst
• The best-case scenario? Get a project lead and domain expert involved. Just remember, the domain expert/s will and should change depending on the type and complexity of the project.

Personalities and strengths play into finding the right person. For example, if a development team’s technical expert isn’t comfortable with stakeholder interviews, have them draft questions while someone else leads the discussion.

Step 3. Interview project stakeholders

Once you’ve identified key stakeholders, meet with them to get an idea of what they hope to get from the project. Understanding what you need to achieve is critical, as this will be the deciding factor behind what deliverables you create.

Step 4. Gather and document your findings

Also known as requirements management, you’ll use a project requirements template at this stage to take the info from above and shape it into something that makes sense for you and your team (click on the link above to make a copy of ours!).

Depending on the project’s complexity, you might have to speak with multiple stakeholders to fully understand the project scope of work — each may have different requirements.

But remember that not all project requirements are necessary for success. Ask yourself: Is this requirement essential to achieving the business goal?

This is where you assess if the project requirements are:

• Inconsistent or duplicated
• Not feasible based on resources and logic

These two points are significant factors that can frustrate your team, waste their time, and cause delays.

Remember to identify and assess project risks as part of this process. Get your team together for a brainstorming session to figure out how to reduce those risks to ensure you stick to the project timeline and stay within budget.

Step 5. Break down the deliverables into smaller chunks

Once you understand the project goals and objectives better, you can start to determine what effort needs to go into the project to deliver it successfully.

Use a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) to break the project into manageable phases and tasks. 

A WBS is a hierarchical outline of the tasks and workflows required to complete a project. The WBS “breaks down” the structure of a project into manageable deliverables or phases.

It helps streamline, visualize, and manage projects more efficiently. It also serves as a framework for detailed cost estimation and control and an overall project schedule guide.

You can download our free WBS template here (just make a copy to customize it). It will help you understand what resources are needed for the project, as well as create an initial project timeline and project budget.

Step 6. Create your baseline budget and timeline

Once you fully understand the scope of work, you’ll need to create your baseline project budget and timeline.

You can do this by allocating costs to each task within your WBS. Or, if you’re using Toggl Track, you can access past project data within the Project Dashboard to pull together a quick baseline estimate. Task-level functionality is also available within the same dashboard.

Step 7. Get approval from project stakeholders

Meet with key stakeholders to present your baseline estimates. Get their feedback, ask more questions, clarify requirements, and get approval to start.

It’s all part of the process. Good project requirements gathering may mean a lot of back and forth. But you’ll remedy the expensive and infuriating process of reworking project deliverables long after the deadline because “that wasn’t quite what we wanted!”.

Step 8. Create your statement of work

Once you understand everything, it’s time to create and sign a statement of work, including all the information you’ve collected in the previous steps.

Your SoW acts as your safety net if the project gets somewhat out of control. It should outline project tasks, deliverables, timelines, and costs, including anything out of scope.

Requirements gathering techniques

Let’s circle back to that part where you magically find out everything you need to know about your stakeholders’ requirements. Here are some tried and tested techniques you can use to extract this essential information without feeling like you’re pulling teeth:

Questionnaires

Questionnaires are convenient if you need to gather the requirements for your entire project asynchronously. You’ll simply create your list of questions, submit them, and wait for the answers to roll in. They’re particularly useful if you need to ask the same questions to a wide range of stakeholders.

Broad questions like “What are the requirements?” are too vague. Instead, ask questions about what they want and hope to accomplish. Then translate the desires, goals, and objectives into deliverables, a timeline, and a budget you and your team members can work with.

How does this work? The goal is to ask the kinds of questions that describe the requirements regarding business needs — as they will provide more actionable info for your project team. For example:

• “What problem are we trying to solve?” (and resist adding “and how do we solve it?”—that isn’t their job)
• “Can you describe [current solution] for me?”
• “What are the pain points/issues with the current process?”
• “What would an ideal experience for [project topic] look like?”

User stories

Use case scenarios are a useful technique to prep for the requirements confirmation stage. Based on the information you know, either collected through questionnaires, focus groups, or any other technique, you’ll flesh out a description of how you expect your team members to execute a project.

You’ll include plenty of detail, such as role responsibilities, user needs, and the steps they’ll take to reach your project goal. Then you’ll present your user story to stakeholders and ask them to validate it.

Prototypes

Prototypes have a similar goal to use cases. This technique requires you to create a prototype to show what the deliverable could look like for end-users. You’ll present your prototype to stakeholders for validation, allowing you to tinker with the requirements to ensure they meet your project objectives.

Mind mapping

Mind mapping is great for visual learners or for documenting requirements when your projects are more complex than the traditional list of resources or “jobs to be done.”

It’s a type of visual brainstorming — you’ll place your business requirement or project goal in the center of your mind map, then offshoot it with bubbles depicting each of your technical requirements. Keep branching out with different levels and sub-levels of bubbles until you have a visual roadmap that accurately depicts your requirements.

3 common challenges of gathering project requirements

“Essential but not easy” would be a good way to sum up the practice of essential requirements gathering. Here are three common challenges you may encounter as you conduct this process.

Preventing scope creep

Projects that aren’t planned out to the letter have a habit of spiraling, going off on tangents, and draining your resources. Avoid getting into a situation where your project demands more and more requirements post-kick-off by having a solid, pre-approved statement of work. This allows you to manage requirements by maintaining control and focus. It also provides enough leverage to renegotiate your project agreement if scope creep does occur.

Documenting the requirements

We’ve talked about the importance of getting your project needs and requirements written down so they’re set in stone. But how? It’ll be no surprise that we’re not a fan of the old-fashioned paper and pen method. Honestly, spreadsheets can be pretty cumbersome, too, particularly as your projects and business scale.

In most cases, project management software is a strong option, particularly as many have a free version. As you prioritize different software requirements, look for a platform that offers:

• Customizable requirements gathering templates
• Real-time traceability
• A positive user experience

Anticipating change

Often, a project’s technical requirements won’t be static, and you’ll need to anticipate change throughout the process. To prevent future change requests from derailing your budget or timeline, include these three things in your initial SoW:

• A clear definition of what falls within the project scope
• An explanation of how changes will be addressed (e.g., additional costs)
• An agreement that stakeholders accept any changes in terms before they’re acted upon

Gathering project requirements is a skill to hone

Collecting different types of requirements, documenting them, and weaving them into your project plan is crucial to its success. It keeps the project scope in line, satisfies stakeholders, and allows you to stay comfortably within budget and deadline.

Sure, the collect requirements process in project management may feel a little daunting at first — but it’s a skill you can hone using the methodology above.

Need extra tips? Check out our blogs on project cost estimating and project time estimation.

Ever feel like you’re going 100 miles per hour, but the to-do list keeps growing, and there’s no time left for a breather or quality family moments? You’re not the first to be overwhelmed (and certainly not the last), but with better time management, you can find that elusive work-life balance.

And, no. We’re not trying to get you to track your time just to see where your minutes go. The goal should be less about trying to cram more into your day and more about understanding where your time goes so that you can make intentional choices as needed. 

Categorizing your time entries gives you a bird’s-eye view of your life. From up there, everything looks a lot clearer. You can see where you’re burning too much fuel and where you need to kick it into high gear. So, let’s look at 13 time tracking categories that’ll help you shift your life into smooth, comfortable cruise control.

TL;DR — Key Takeaways

• Categorizing your time entries can help you spot trends, optimize your workflow, and reduce stress, all while achieving a better work-life balance.
• Work-related categories like billable vs. non-billable tasks, meetings, project work, administrative duties, and deep work can streamline your professional life.
• On the flip side, life-related categories like family time, exercise and health, leisure and hobbies, household chores, and personal development keep your personal life in check.
• Use software (like Toggl Track) to get accurate, real-time data and make informed decisions that enhance your productivity.

What’s the point of categorizing your time entries?

Well, assuming you’re tracking your time already to even have time entries to categorize, sorting your activities into distinct categories allows you to start to see patterns emerge. For example, you might see where you’re spending too much time, where you could be more efficient, and where you might be neglecting important aspects of your life. 

Taking a structured approach like this can boost your productivity by allowing you to zero in on those high-priority tasks while minimizing time-wasters. This improves your focus and reduces stress. It can also help you balance your work and personal life better. Say goodbye to constant catch-up and hello to feeling well-rested! 

Work-related time tracking categories

Work-related categories enable you and your employees to track time and compartmentalize your professional tasks, making it easier to track where your time goes when you’re on the clock. When you can track and visualize how your hours are allocated, you can identify improvement areas. By recognizing when you’re spending hours in meetings that could have easily been emails, you can reclaim that time and restructure your schedule to enhance your professional productivity.

Billable vs. non-billable

Let’s get a few definitions straight. Billable work refers to tasks you can directly charge clients for, such as project consultations, design work, or coding sessions. Non-billable work, on the other hand, includes activities like internal meetings, training, and administrative tasks that don’t generate direct revenue.

Employee time tracking of billable and non-billable work is important for accurate client billing (especially hourly rates). It can help you charge clients correctly while optimizing your team’s time or resources. Understanding this distinction gives you clear insights into which activities drive profitability and which may need streamlining. Maybe non-billable tasks take up most of your day, signaling you need to rework these processes. 

Meetings

Meetings might be billable or non-billable, depending on their purpose (for example, is this a strategy session with your client that can be invoiced or an internal training meeting?). By accurately logging and categorizing these meetings, you can guarantee your clients are billed fairly and your non-billable time is managed efficiently. 

For example, if you notice your weekly team stand-ups are always running over, you can make adjustments, like sticking to the agenda or limiting the duration. Tracking this data can also reveal whether certain meetings are necessary at all. If a particular meeting could be replaced with a quick email or chat, you can make those changes to free up more time for high-impact tasks.

This means better time management, clearer communication, and a more focused approach to meeting your business goals!

Project work

You should log the hours spent on your project’s tasks to get a clear picture of where your team’s time is being invested and whether it aligns with your specific project goals. 

Setting realistic time goals for each task is key. Start by breaking down larger projects into manageable phases and creating a time tracking category for each phase. This helps monitor progress, and you can also rest easy knowing that no part of the project is overlooked. 

If you’re an agency working on a marketing campaign, you might have sub-categories that look like “Research,” “Content Creation,” “Design,” or “Review.” By tracking time with ultra-specific categories, you can identify bottlenecks and address them proactively. 

Administrative tasks

If you don’t track administrative tasks, you might wonder where your workday went. Admin work can easily pile up and take away time from high-impact tasks. Log all the time spent on busy work like scheduling, paperwork, or emailing to identify any inefficiencies in your workflow. 

Emails taking up half your day? Try using email filters or setting up automated responses. And don’t be afraid to invest in a project management tool or two (we promise it’s not cheating) to alleviate some of this admin work.

Deep work

Deep work refers to periods of intense, undistracted focus on cognitively demanding tasks — essential for producing the high-quality results your work demands. Tracking these sessions helps you understand how much time you truly dedicate to deep work. It also identifies patterns that enhance (or hinder) your concentration.

Minimize distractions by turning off your notifications, finding a quiet space where you can concentrate, and letting ‌colleagues know this is your “do-not-disturb” time. Dedicate around 90-minute intervals to these tasks, and give yourself some much-needed downtime when you finish.

Client communication

If you want to improve your service delivery and client satisfaction, you should definitely track the time spent on client interactions. This is especially important for professionals like freelancers, lawyers, or agency workers who often juggle multiple clients and projects. 

Logging these interactions gives you a solid understanding of how much time is devoted to billable versus non-billable tasks, improving the accuracy of your invoicing. And this helps you optimize your schedule, making sure you’re maximizing productivity and profitability.

Learning, training, and development

Spending work hours on training and learning is a great way to grow professionally and enhance your skills. But it’s still time that needs to be tracked, whether you’re taking courses, attending webinars, or engaging with other educational resources. 

By logging these hours, you can picture how much time you’re investing in your development, which is essential for staying competitive in your field. It gives you measurable proof of your commitment to self-improvement and can even boost your motivation by making your progress visible and tangible.

Life-related time tracking categories

While it might seem unusual to track time for personal activities, doing so can be a game-changer. If you spend some time categorizing your time into areas like family, leisure, or chores, you get a clearer picture of how well you’re actually balancing your life. 

This info can prevent burnout and adjust your routine so you’re not neglecting areas that bring you joy and keep you healthy. If you notice you’re spending too much time on work and not enough on hobbies, it’s time to carve out more time for self-care.

Not sure how to do that? Here’s an example from one Reddit user who uses Toggl Track to visualize the time they’re spending on categories like health, learning, relaxation, and social.

Family time

Relationships are important, and tracking the time you spend with family can be incredibly rewarding. Let’s face it — our lives are hectic, and it’s easy to let work and other commitments overshadow the moments that really matter. Set aside specific time slots reserved just for family activities like dinner or walks in the park to make sure those relationships are a priority. 

Exercise and health

Whether it’s meal prep, meditation, or a workout, set aside dedicated time for these activities in your life. By keeping a log, you can stay motivated by seeing your progress. A healthy mind and body make you feel more energized and resilient to tackle all the other important areas of your life.

Leisure and hobbies

Tracking your leisure activities and hobbies is just as important as tracking your work and responsibilities. These moments of relaxation and personal interest are crucial for maintaining a balanced lifestyle. Set aside specific time for hobbies like reading, painting, or playing music to enhance your creativity and reduce the risk of burnout. Here’s where you can also allocate a set amount of time for some social media scrolling!

Household chores

Chores can pile up, but if you track the time spent on them, you can better manage these domestic duties. Keeping a log shows you how much time each task takes, which helps when you’re planning and prioritizing, especially between family members.

Personal development

Just like you might track work-related learning and training, you should also track personal growth activities. This might be reading, learning new skills, or attending workshops. These activities enrich your life and open doors to new opportunities. So, make a commitment to yourself and start tracking your personal development to stay on track and achieve your goals.

Best practices for creating and using time tracking categories

Stick with whatever works best for you when it comes to creating and using tracking categories. But if you’re having trouble getting started, here are our top time tracking best practices:

• Keep it simple: Don’t confuse yourself (or others) with complicated category names — use straightforward language to ensure everyone understands what each category is for. 
• Be consistent: You have to track your time consistently if you want your insights to mean anything valuable, so make sure all your team members use the same categories.
• Regularly review and adjust: Check in regularly to ensure your categories are still relevant as your business evolves or your personal life changes — it’s okay to add, remove, or modify!
• Limit the number of categories: Too many categories can be overwhelming (and confusing), so stick to a manageable number that covers all the necessary areas without being overly complex.
• Integrate with other tools: Sync your time tracking categories with time blocking or time tracking apps to make sure your entries are accurate.
• Align with goals: Create categories that reflect your business operations or personal ambitions—like “admin tasks” or “exercise.”

Tips for maximizing the effectiveness of time tracking data

Small activities add up and can go unnoticed if you don’t track them. Be sure to track every activity relevant to your goals and objectives and categorize them properly. This way, when you go to analyze your data, you’ll be able to identify trends or patterns accurately.

Which tasks consume the most time? Which clients are most profitable? You can answer these questions by looking at your time tracking data to improve your decision-making and efficiency. These insights will identify the high-value tasks to prioritize, as well as the low-value ones you may want to automate or delegate.

Do you need time tracking software for this?

Time tracking software may not be a “need” when it comes to organizing time tracking categories, but it can make organizing your time much easier. Think of it like this: You need a basic watch to tell time, but you want a smartwatch to track your steps, heart rate, or calories burned. 

Manual time categorization can result in human error and just takes a whole lot more time. A time tracker like Toggl Track is your smartwatch. It delivers accurate, real-time data paired with advanced metrics and reporting capabilities. The result? More informed decision-making and more time spent being productive.

Toggl Track offers multiple ways to organize time tracking categories, including by Client and Project. Within a project, you can add time entries for tasks (think of these as sub-projects).

Another option is to use tags, which are great for categorizing time in both your work and personal life. Start by creating time entries for the activities you want to track. Each entry should include details such as the start time, duration, and, optionally, a stop time and description. While creating or editing a time entry, add one or more tags to categorize and locate specific time entries within your workspace. (These tags are your time tracking categories.) 

Remember to apply consistent tags across similar activities to simplify grouping and analysis later. You can also use these tags in reports to filter and group time entries, allowing you to analyze time spent on different activities based on the tags applied. 

Start creating time tracking categories in Toggl Track

Whether you’re tracking working time or personal time, Toggl Track makes it easy to visualize your work-life balance. With a user-friendly interface, you can easily set up tags to group and analyze your activities. Did someone say efficient time management?

Try Toggl Track for free and find out exactly what we mean!

How good is your memory? Good enough to remember every hour, half-hour, or five-minute chunk you spent working for a particular client in the past month? Nope, us neither. But luckily, billable hours trackers exist to accurately log every second you spend on client work.

The right tool will help you invoice accurately, manage your time better, increase profitability, and improve trust with clients. You’ll never have to worry about overbilling or underbilling again.

But which is the best billable hours tracker software in the market? This guide breaks down the key features of nine popular tools, including their pricing, integrations, and pros and cons.

What is the best billable hours tracker?

Here’s a list of our top tools that teams and individuals can use to track billable hours.

• Toggl Track: Best for companies of any size or type that need a simple yet powerful solution for tracking billable time, billing clients accurately, and generating insightful time reports.
• Timely: Best for teams looking for a non-invasive time tracking software that reduces admin tasks and accurately records billable time.
• ClickTime: Best for teams requiring project time tracking software to monitor billable time spent on projects and understanding productivity and performance. 
• Harvest: Best for teams and freelancers who need powerful billable time tracking software to bill clients accurately, streamline invoicing, and get paid faster.
• TimeCamp: Best for teams who want an automatic billable time tracker that monitors employee activity with surveillance features. 
• Hubstaff: Best for remote teams who want to monitor employee work activity and improve time management and productivity.
• MyHours: Best for teams looking for simple project timekeeping and billing software.
• Everhour: Best for teams who seek an all-in-one time management and shift scheduling tool to track billable hours, profitability, and productivity. 
• actiTIME: Best for teams needing a simple invoicing and time tracking tool.

1. Toggl Track

Price: The free plan is available for up to five users. Premium pricing starts at $9/month with a 30-day free trial.

Toggl Track is an easy-to-use, powerful time tracking, reporting, and billing software that helps companies of any size or type bill clients accurately and get real-time insights on billable and non-billable work. 

Toggl Track comes with a generous free plan for startups and small teams that includes unlimited time tracking via web app, mobile app, and desktop apps and 100+ custom-built integrations with popular tools, enabling a seamless dataflow of information. At the other end of the scale, Toggl Track also supports enterprise companies in meeting strategic goals.

What we like

Toggl Track accurately captures billable and non-billable hours using web, mobile, desktop, and browser extensions. Toggl Track generates invoices from tracked time and detailed billable time reports that you can easily share with clients for transparency. You can also fully customize your reports.

Yugo M., a small business founder, shares his positive experience of Toggl Track:

“Switching to Toggl Track has been one of the best decisions for our team. From the moment we started using it, the platform’s intuitive and user-friendly interface stood out, making it incredibly easy to track time and manage projects. The detailed, customizable reports provide invaluable insights into our productivity and project progress, helping us identify areas for improvement and celebrate our successes.”

For enterprise customers, Toggl Track is a trusty sidekick that supports companies with a range of enterprise-grade customizations. For example, you can create bulk actions to reduce admin work and speed up your onboarding and internal operations. Similarly, custom reports deliver access to data that will protect your business and take it to the next level.

Toggl Track has a strict anti-surveillance policy. We strongly believe that companies are way too comfortable trying to control their employees, and we’re passionate about presenting an alternative that promises to skyrocket productivity without any weird spying tactics.

What’s missing

Creepy screen recordings, webcams, keystroke logging, or GPS trackers are not part of Toggl Track and never will be. If employee surveillance is part of your plans, you’ll need a different tool.

Top features

• Billable and non-billable time tracking: Easily track paid and non-paid hours online and offline on multiple platforms for accurate invoicing and billing. 
• Billing rates: Set billable rates for the entire organization or at project, client, team member, or task level to create accurate invoices and streamline payroll. You can also edit and manage historical billable rates in Toggl Track. 
• Invoice management: Create PDF invoices based on your tracked time and customize them with your company logo and custom fields. 
• Multi-platform tracking: Track time via the mobile (iOS and Android) and desktop app, on the web, or from other tools you use to ensure you record every billable activity.
• Detailed reports: Generate reports on project profitability, team capacity and workloads, and get forecasting profitability insights. 
• Reliability and security: We offer a 99.99% guarantee of uptime and GDPR compliance, ensuring your data is available and protected.
• Exceptional customer support: Toggl’s team are available 24/7 with a typical response time of 4 hours. Larger companies work with a dedicated customer success manager.
• Custom dashboards: Forget cookie cutters. Toggl Track provides custom charts so you can track the data that makes the most sense to your business.

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best For
Free	$0	Solo users who need a time tracker with an intuitive interface
Starter	$9 per user per month	Teams with basic time tracking needs
Premium	$18 per user per month	Teams who need online and offline functionality for tracking time and profitability
Enterprise	Custom pricing	Enterprise teams

2. Timely

Price: Starts at $9/month.

Timely is an AI-powered billable hour tracker that tracks billable hourly rates automatically and improves time management by eliminating manual time tracking. 

What we like

With AI-based time tracking, teams no longer spend their time tracking time, nor do they forget to. Instead, Timely simply tracks time automatically in the background, freeing teams up to spend time on value-adding work.

Crucially, though, Timely is a noninvasive tool that keeps all tracked activity private. Like Toggl, Timely also takes user privacy seriously, giving users the power to share or retain their tracked “Memories” without a hint of surveillance or spyware.

What’s missing

Several users also report problems with task or project categorization. One computer software user explains, “For some websites or programs, it chucks your usage into one big block. My specific gripe is with Salesforce. I am usually working multiple cases or accounts, and it struggles to chop them up into their own block.”

Similarly, Simon, a small business CEO, reports, “Timely does have access to a lot of data that it can use to create a timesheet, but it doesn’t really understand what you do. The concept fools you into believing that you have more accuracy and consistency; that you get to leave the “driving” to Timely, and all you need to do is give it some guidelines from time to time.”

Simo adds, “We saw, in a systematic (larger) way, that our timesheets became, in fact, less accurate. Some people in our organization started slacking on writing the timesheets because they felt they had all the historical data in Timely and could do it whenever, even months later. What we observed is that when using Timely, you end up leaving it up to an AI model that doesn’t really know what you did to create your timesheets. At some level, it becomes random.”

Top features

• Automatic billable time tracking: Timely tracks every billable minute automatically so you can focus on more profitable tasks.
• AI timesheets: Timely uses AI to draft accurate timesheets, remove manual errors, and bill clients correctly. 
• Team member billable rates: Set individual rates for each team member and easily update them.
• Reports dashboard: Access your billable time reports or create custom reports in a single view. 

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Starter	$9 per user per month	Freelancers and small teams
Premium	$16 per user per month	Midsize teams
Unlimited	$22 per user per month	Midsize and large teams
Unlimited+	Contact for more pricing	Large teams

Visit the pricing page for more information.

3. ClickTime

Price: Starts at $13/month.

ClickTime is a project time tracking software that tracks billable and non-billable time, overtime, productivity, and utilization. It also has resource management and project planning features, and it tracks expenses and time off. 

What we like

ClickTime comes with 70+ prebuilt reports on billable time, budgets, resource capacity, expenses, overtime, and employee performance. It’s an incredibly intuitive software to snap into your workflows; as Camillo A., a program officer, describes, “As an employee and a manager, the system is very intuitive and easy to manage. I like how there are separate tabs for reviewing employee entries and managing your personal time. I like the actual functionality of how you add hours through a grid.”

What’s missing

ClickTime doesn’t have a free plan, although slight discounts are available for non-profit organizations. It also doesn’t come with invoice generation or project budget forecasting features. Some users also report problems with the platform being slow to use.

Top features

• Accurate time tracking: Although ClickTime doesn’t track time automatically, it lets you clock in and out on Android and iPhone apps. You can also add time entries manually. 
• Billable rates: Keep your invoices and payroll accurate by setting billable rates for team members, projects, or tasks. 
• Automated timesheets: ClickTime generates accurate timesheets based on time entries and lets you customize them. 
• Detailed reports: Get reports showing profitable projects and explore forecasting insights. Visualize your team’s projects and schedules with team capacity and workload reports. 

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Starter	$13 per user per month	Freelancers and small teams
Team	$17 per user per month	Midsize teams
Premier	$28 per user per month	Midsize and large teams
Enterprise	Contact for more pricing	Enterprise teams

Visit the pricing page for more information.

4. Harvest

Price: Harvest offers a free plan for basic time tracking.

Harvest is a billable hour tracker that teams and individuals can use to track time, create and send client invoices, and receive payments without leaving the app. 

What we like

Harvest’s end-to-end workflow streamlines the entire billing workflow. It tracks billable hours, generates invoices based on tracked time, and securely collects client payments through Stripe and PayPal integrations. 

Daniel C., a brand consultant, explains how Harvest’s simplicity is one of its strengths: “Harvest is simply a time tracker for projects. It’s simple and easy to use. It integrates where I need it to. It doesn’t try to be more than a time tracker. It just stays in its lane, does so with excellence, and doesn’t cause problems.”

What’s missing

Harvest doesn’t track time automatically and could benefit from more functionality in the tools’s reporting feature, as described by a small business user: “It would be nice if they offered more robust reports. The reports offered are basic.”

Top features

• Billable and non-billable time tracking: Accurately track paid hours to avoid losing money and record non-paid activities to understand profitability. 
• Billing rates: Set billable rates for tasks and team members to generate accurate invoices and simplify payroll. 
• Invoicing: Convert time and expenses into easy-to-share client invoices. 
• Online payments: Receive secure payments through Stripe and Paypal Standard. If you send recurring invoices, Harvest lets you set up recurring payments through Stripe.

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Free	$0	Freelancers who need to track their time for client billing
Pro	$11 per seat/month	Teams and startups who need to understand where their time goes and monitor profitability
Premium	$14 per seat/month	Teams with advanced reporting and administrative needs

Visit the pricing page for more information.

5. TimeCamp

Price: Starts at $2.99/month.

TimeCamp is a billable hour tracker with employee monitoring features that tracks billable time, attendance, employee activity, and project profitability.

What we like

TimeCamp exists to show people (solo users as well as enterprise companies) how productive they are. Along with tracking time, it delivers insights on efficiency so you can understand how every dollar of your resources is working for you.

Talking of money, TimeCamp is an affordable time tracking, attendance, and billing tool, starting at $2.99 per user per month. Be aware that the Starter plan doesn’t offer billable tracking features. 

What’s missing

The downside of this automated tracker is that it can feel invasive to employees. TimeCamp takes screenshots and tracks all the apps and websites employees visit during work hours. Unsurprisingly, one user calls out that the platform feels like “it’s micromanaging.”

Top features

• Keyword-based time tracking: TimeCamp tracks time automatically on desktop apps based on relevant keywords. 
• Historical billing rates: Available only in Premium and Ultimate plans, this feature lets you manage historical billable rates for more accurate billing and reporting. 
• Invoices and expenses: Keep track of project expenses and generate invoices based on timesheets to bill clients accurately. 
• Financial reporting: See billable and unbillable time, revenue, and costreports and track project profitability and client billability. 

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Starter	$2.99 per user per month	Teams with more complex time-tracking needs
Premium	$4.99 per user per month	Large teams that need advanced time-tracking features
Ultimate	$7.99 per user per month	Multiple teams
Enterprise	$11.99 per user per month	Enterprise teams

Visit the pricing page for more information.

6. Hubstaff

Price: Starts at $7/month.

Hubstaff is a time tracking and workforce management app that tracks and monitors activity for global teams that work remotely. It has workforce management, productivity analysis, and payroll features. 

What we like

Hubstaff makes it easy to track billable time and understand employee productivity trends. It generates time and activity reports with work hours tracked, payroll, apps, and URL activity.

Managing time off and tracking attendance is also easy with Hubstaff, which offers a GPS tracker that automatically clocks employees in and out of specific work locations. Business owner Manideepa P. describes, “This app also sends notifications to remind the user about break time, idle time, etc., so it’s super easy to use, and I would recommend it to others as well.”

What’s missing

You can’t generate project profitability or custom reports in Hubstaff, and timesheet approvals are only available in higher-priced plans. 

As employees come and go, it’s not necessarily easy to offboard a user and revoke access to their account without losing crucial time tracking details about a specific project. One small business user describes, “You can’t disable an ex-colleague’s account while retaining their data without paying for a license.”

Top features

• Billable & non-billable hours: Use the timer to track billable and non-billable hours or manually add time entries. 
• Billable rates: Set up account, project, and team member billing rates. Send accurate client invoices, create realistic estimates, and pay team members correctly for their work.  
• Time and activity reports: See your team’s tracked time, activity, and how much time they spend on each task. 
• Overtime tracker: Set billable hours limits in Hubstaff and get notifications when employees work overtime. 
• Productivity analytics: Hubstaff generates timesheets, screenshots, and activity metrics to help you understand and improve your team’s productivity. 

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Starter	$4.99 per user per month	Small businesses who need a basic time-tracking solution
Grow	$7.50 per user per month	Teams who need to monitor remote employee time
Team	$10 per user per month	Teams who need advanced time-tracking, team management, and time management features
Enterprise	Contact Hubstaff for prices, starting at $25 per user per month	Enterprise companies

Visit the pricing page for more information.

7. MyHours

Price: MyHours offers a free plan for up to five users.

MyHours is aimed at companies that want to automate their timesheet processes and gain insights into how they spend time and budgets. It’s a cinch for anyone who’s already familiar with using spreadsheets for time logs.

What we like

MyHours offers insights into billable project time with detailed reports that can easily be shared with clients for transparency, proof of work, and accurate invoicing. Timesheet reminders are automatic, and XLS exports are pre-scheduled for convenience.

Users report how easy it is to see the information they need. For example, Lauren R., a senior interior designer, says, “As a boutique interior design studio, we have a range of different-scale projects that we need to keep track of. What I like about MyHours is the ease of entering information, categorising tasks, and running reports so that we can have a clear view of how projects are tracking.”

What’s missing

MyHours doesn’t have custom reporting and timesheet approval features, and it’s mostly suitable for project teams. 

Additionally, the simplicity of its pricing approach can be offputting for some users. Daniel H., a small business complains there are only two plans available: free and Pro. “The paid version has some handy features I would like but it also has billing and invoicing which I dont require. I’d love to see an intermediate tier with more timesheet features but no billing / invoicing.”

Top features

• Automatic time tracking: MyHours’s timesheet chatbot uses natural language processing to automatically fill your timesheet. 
• Billable rates: Set billable rates for projects, tasks, and team members to accurately calculate billable costs for your invoices. 
• Weekly timesheets: MyHours can use the AI chatbot to create weekly timesheets or generate them automatically from your time tracked. 
• Project profitability and forecasting reports: See how profitable your projects are daily, weekly, and monthly. These reports also show the most and least profitable projects and clients. 

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Free	$0 per user	Solo users and teams who need access to billable rates and detailed reports
Pro	$8 per user per month	Freelancers and teams who need access to labor costs and invoicing features

Visit the pricing page for more information.

8. Everhour

Price: Starts at $10/month.

Everhour is an all-in-one timesheet, shift scheduling, and time management software that streamlines billable time tracking, budgeting, client invoicing, and payroll management. You can integrate Everhour with your existing project management tool or use it as a standalone tool. 

What we like

Everhour offers flexible billing solutions (non-billable, time and materials, or fixed fee) and lets you create client profiles and monitor budgets. You can set capital or recurring budgets, receive alerts for budget limits, track labor costs, and customize task rates. These features give you better financial oversight to improve profitability.

Many users report the platform’s ease of use. Small business owner Joel S. said, “Everhour integrates perfectly into Asana, where we manage all of our work, and Xero, where we bill all of our clients and pay our contractors. No more using outside time tracking tools, copying and pasting task titles into the outside tool, and wondering which time entries apply to which tasks.”

What’s missing

If you need to review past projects, Everhour lacks historical billable rates, which can make it difficult to grab the data you need. Additionally, the tracking may be temperamental depending on the task you’re completing.

For this reason, here’s why web designer Timothy B., prefers Toggl Track to Everhour. “With Everhour you need to stay on the page of the project you’re working on or make sure you remember to stop the timer if you’re doing something else. This can be problematic; sometimes you might be doing something like using a CRM that is updating plugins or something for the job, but it won’t track that time on that page. So you need to make sure your time is correct in the end. Toggl Track is another tool that seems to do the page swapping better while tracking the time.”

Top features

• Billable and non-billable tasks: Tracking paid and non-paid time accurately helps you bill clients correctly and analyze profitability. 
• Billing rates: Create project-level billing rates and streamline invoicing and payroll processes. 
• Timesheets: Everhour automatically creates timesheets based on time tracked and lets managers approve or reject them.  
• Reporting: Generate team capacity and workload reports to realistically schedule your team’s work. Create custom reports and dashboards with filters, columns, and specific time data you want to see.

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Free	$0	Solo users who need an intuitive and user-friendly time tracker
Team	$10 per user per month	Teams who need time and project tracking, task management, and project-scheduling features

Visit the pricing page for more information. 

9. actiTIME

Price: actiTime offers a free plan with limited functionality.

actiTime is a time tracking and billing software that helps teams track billable hours and create and manage timesheets and invoices. 

What we like

actiTime is a simple time billing solution that lets you set billable, overtime, and leave time rates to facilitate employee payroll and client billing. With actiTime’s time and financial reports that show billable time, project costs, and profitability, you can analyze how cost-efficient your business is. 

Here’s how Scott S., a small business president, describes why this reporting functionality has been a game-changer for his company: “It has incredible features, including task management, time monitoring, and data analysis. With it, I can manage my projects, crew, and clients without any trouble. I can easily keep track of my work and deadlines because of the reports section’s incredible detail.”

What’s missing

actiTime doesn’t have automatic time tracking, historical billable rates, or custom reporting features. It also offers a simple interface which may be comforting for those who don’t like the bells and whistles of more complex tools. However, others would prefer an update.

Jeanine M., a data analyst, remarks, “This tool works well and I don’t have problems using it at the moment, until now it offers multiple benefits that I haven’t seen in other applications. If one detail I would take into account is that you can consider improving the interface of this program.”

Top features

• Timesheets: You can create timesheets manually or let actiTime generate them automatically based on your tracked hours. Managers can approve and reject employees’ timesheet data in actiTime. 
• Billing rates: Set task-level billable rates in actiTime, and it calculates your earnings based on your time tracked. 
• Billing and cost analysis: Choose from billing summary, invoice export, cost of work, and profit/loss reports to understand business profitability. 
• Automated invoicing: actiTime takes your billable hours data and turns it into ready-to-share invoices. 

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Free	$0 per user (1-3 users)	Solo users who need limited functionality
Premium	$6 per user (1-40 users)	Small teams who need time tracking and invoicing features
Premium	$5 per user (41-200 users)	Larger teams who need time tracking and invoicing
Custom	Fixed cost pricing	Accurate pricing is available from the vendor for teams of 200+ users

Visit the pricing page for more information. 

Best tool for tracking billable hours: Quick comparison

Whew. We just threw a lot at you. If you just need a quick TL;DR, here’s an overview of the current best tools for tracking billable hours.

Tool	G2	Best for	Cheapest Paid Plan
Toggl Track	4.6	Best billable time tracking software	From $9/user/month
Timely	4.8	Best AI-based automatic time tracking	From $9/user/month
ClickTime	4.6	Best project time tracking software	From $13/user/month
Harvest	4.3	Best billable time tracking software with payments	From $11/user/month
TimeCamp	4.7	Most affordable time billing software	From $2.99/user/month
Hubstaff	4.5	Best for employee monitoring and surveillance software	From $7/user/month
MyHours	4.6	Simple project time reporting software	From $8/user/month
Everhour	4.7	Best billable timesheet tracking software	From $10/user/month
actiTIME	4.5	Best for simple time tracking and invoicing	From $6/user/month

How do I choose the best billable hours software?

It really comes down to what you and your team need. Different teams in different industries need unique features, and sometimes. the smallest feature can make or break a decision to choose one tool over another.

To choose the best billable hours software, focus on these aspects:

• Features: What other features do you need besides billable time tracking? Does the tool have these features?
• Ease of use: Is the tool user-friendly to ensure your team will enjoy using it?
• Accurate time tracking: Can it accurately track both billable and non-billable hours for invoicing?
• Detailed reporting features: Does the tool deliver clear insights on billable and non-billable work? Can you easily share detailed billing reports with clients for transparency?
• Data security: How secure is your client data with this tool?
• Cost: Is the tool budget-friendly? If you’re on a limited budget, a tool with a generous free plan can be a good option. 

Try a billable hours tracker for free

If you’re not sure which tool to choose yet, we recommend simply trying some of the tools on this list before committing to a purchase. It’s a big decision, especially if you manage a larger team, and the last thing you want to do is implement a clunky system without everything you really need.

You can try Toggl Track for free, for example, and see how it seamlessly tracks billable time, generates reports on billable and non-billable hours, and improves your productivity and profitability.  

Or, schedule a free demo of Toggl Track to get a personalized walkthrough of exactly how it can fit into your existing workflows to help you track billable times to increase revenue.

No matter how well you plan your agile software development projects, it can feel like every release goes down to the wire. Perfecting your time management skills will overcome this panic, and time tracking tools are a great way to get started.

If you’re one of the whopping 23% of software teams using Jira, you may not know the platform recently added time tracking to its list of features. Sounds like a good addition, doesn’t it? But, as time tracking experts, we’d urge you to extend Jira’s functionality by pairing it with a dedicated time tracking app instead.

This article explores how to track time in Jira and the pros and cons of its native tracking feature. As a comparison, we’ll also look at the best Jira time-tracking plugins to take your time tracking to the next level!

TL;DR — Key Takeaways

• Jira is one of the best and most used project management tools in the world and now includes manual time tracking for Issues, Epics, Tasks, and Sub-Tasks.
• But, despite Jira’s brilliance, it’s a fairly limited time tracking tool. Time entries are incredibly manual, leading to inaccuracy, inefficiency, and user frustration.
• To help, we recommend integrating Jira with one of these tracking tools:
  • Toggl Track: Best for beautiful UI that integrates an easy-to-use start/stop timer directly into Jira’s interface.
  • Memtime: Automatic desktop tracking that mimics your Jira structure and provides a two-way sync.
  • Everhour: Project-based time tracking, great for billable hours, expense management, and time-based reporting.
  • Timely: AI-backed time tracking that pulls Jira activity into its Memory timeline, but doesn’t sync back into Jira itself.

How to track time in Jira

Getting started with time tracking in Jira is pretty straightforward, requiring little manual configuration, permission changes, or custom fields. Get started with the following steps:

1. Turn on the correct time tracking settings

Time tracking is turned on by default in Jira Cloud, but you might need to enable the time tracking fields for each issue type within your Jira projects.

To do this, simply:

1. Go to your current project

2. From the left-hand menu, select “Project settings” and then “Issue types.”

3. Depending on your team workflows, you may use any combination of issue types, such as Epics, Tasks, Sub-Tasks, or Bugs. For each one, you want to track, click into it and add the ‘Time Tracking’ field to your configuration.

4. Repeat these steps for all your projects to enable team members to track their time across the board.

2. Estimate each issue to create a time tracking baseline

Before you begin to log time, you need to add time estimates to each piece of work. This gives you a baseline to track against and measures the accuracy of your development estimates.

This is super easy to do:

1. Create your next issue type, e.g. Epic, Task, Sub-Task, etc.
2. As you fill out the key information, use the ‘Original Estimate’ field to capture how long you believe that item will take. The field uses a weeks/days/hours/months format, so make the estimate as large or small as you need.
3. Once completed, the ‘Time Tracking’ field will now have a baseline to work against, giving you everything you need to start tracking your time.

3. Record work time as your project progresses

As the team’s work progresses, you can record your time directly in the Jira issue, capturing the actual time spent on each task versus the estimate. By default, this is a manual process where developers record their time as they work on issues.

Here’s how it works:

1. From the specific Jira Issue, find the Time Tracking field
2. Once selected, a pop-up will appear showing the original estimate alongside two boxes to input ‘Time Spent’ and Time Remaining.’
3. In the Time Spent box, input the amount of time you’ve worked on the Issue so far. Again, this field works on a weeks/days/hours/months format. At this point, additional boxes for Date Started and a Work Description will also appear so that you can record more information.
4. If applicable, you can also update the Time Remaining field with an updated estimate of how long you believe is left on the task. This keeps an updated view of the effort required. However, this doesn’t update the Original Estimate field, maintaining the baseline for you to report against.
5. Once your time is logged, you can see all the details under the Work Log section of the Issue whenever you need.

4. Oversee capacity planning and resource management with Jira project reports

As development teams track their time, managers need to report on work hours to manage team capacity, velocity, and resource demand. You can do this directly from the Jira dashboard, creating a simple timesheet report in just three clicks.

Do the following to gain these insights:

1. From your project, select Reports.
2. On the project sidebar, scroll down to ‘Forecast & Management’ and select the ‘Time Tracking Report’.
3. Set the parameters and select ‘Next’ to get a view of your time tracking performance. Here, you’ll see how your time spent and time remaining compare to your original estimate, with a view of whether you’re on track or forecasting an overrun.

What users love about Jira’s native time tracking features

As one of the world’s most popular project management tools, many users love Jira’s ability to keep all their information in one place. When it comes to time tracking functionalities, here’s what Jira users love:

• Integrated time tracking. Users love that Jira helps them manage their time with the ability to compare actual work vs. estimates.
• Customization. While Jira has many pre-built templates, it’s a very customizable solution, with the ability to re-arrange Jira fields, report on different time metrics, and keep track of hours in real-time.
• Ease of use. Once you’re on board with Jira software, it’s super easy to use with a wide range of issue features covering everything from Tasks, Sub-Tasks, Bug, and Epics.
• Plugins. Popular plugins, such as Tempo, provide add-ons for timesheets and resource planning, invoicing, and billable hours rates.

Are Jira time tracking reports and timesheets accurate? Common Jira issues that users face

Like many things in life, Jira’s time tracking isn’t perfect. While it has the ability for basic time tracking, it falls short in several areas, including:

• Collection method. Both Jira’s native tracking and add-ons like Tempo require teams to manually input their time records. This creates inaccuracy, leaving your time tracking open to errors and discrepancies.
• Basic reporting. While Jira has some good out-of-the-box reports, they aren’t powerful and sometimes fail to provide the depth of information needed for expert time management.
• Little automation. Once time logs are captured, there’s little automation between time records, invoicing, and billing, making the process of getting paid a little clunky in Jira.

To overcome these issues, many Jira users pair the tool with expert time tracking plugins, such as Toggl Track, to seamlessly capture time records before automatically syncing them with Jira issues. This means developers don’t have to manually save down their time cards while also improving accuracy and efficiency.

Sounds good, right? Read on to hear more about how these expert time tracking plugins work!

Best Jira plugins for accurate time tracking

While Jira and Confluence are great for project management, they weren’t built for time tracking and lack the key features you need to take your time management to the next level.

Luckily, Jira’s great connectivity means you can sync it with a range of other apps via plugins. This helps you automate and improve your time tracking without giving up the project management software you love.

We’ve tested all four of these time tracking tools, with their Jira plugins all available (and highly rated) on the Atlassian Marketplace. Let’s dive into each in turn to decide which is best for you.

Toggl Track

Toggl Track combines automatic time tracking, detailed reporting, and a beautiful UI to make it a great all-rounder for time tracking. Its versatility across desktop, browser, and mobile makes it easy to track wherever you are, with handy integrations to other platforms, including Jira, Trello, and QuickBooks. It also automates billing and invoice creation for freelancers and client-facing development teams to help you and your team get paid.

🌟 Toggl Track’s standout features

• Multi-platform time tracking from desktop, phone, or the web, plus Chrome, Firefox, and Edge browser extensions to track time from any web app.
• Tracking reminders, alerts, and required fields reduces admin work and automate your end-to-end billing workflow.
• Detail reports and insights into your time management, enabling you to make data-driven business decisions.
• GDPR compliance with high-grade data security features such as admin rights and audit checking.

🔄 How Toggl Track integrates with JIRA

Toggl Track’s browser extension enables you to quickly start and stop timers from any web application, including Jira. Simply install the browser application, turn on the Jira integration in Toggl Track’s settings, and start tracking with timers directly inside a Jira Issue — it’s as simple as that!

💰 Toggl Track Pricing

Alongside a free plan for up to five users, Toggl Track offers three additional tiers:

• Starter: For $9 per user/mo, Starter is built for small teams to work at a fast pace without a lot of overhead
• Premium: For $18 per user/mo, Premium gives you powerful tools to keep growing teams aligned and agile
• Enterprise: If you need a tailored solution for your large or complex organization, Toggl Track also offers custom pricing for unlimited users.

Memtime

Memtime’s automatic, in-the-background time-tracking takes the admin away from time management. Once installed, the Memtime desktop app tracks your work, storing it by application, project, or client to help you bill for your time, report on your progress, and keep the team focused on the things that matter.

🌟 Memtime’s standout features

• Automatic time tracking for Windows, Mac, and Linux users that doesn’t require you to start/stop timers.
• Integrations with a range of other software tools, including Toggl Track and Jira.
• Generate custom timesheets and reports to analyze your productivity, logged hours, and team efficiency.
• Memtime takes a strong approach to privacy and anti-data sharing, with all data stored locally and not shared with others.

🔄 How Memtime integrates with JIRA

During your Memtime setup, select Jira Cloud from the range of integrations. Once configured, Memtime copies across your Jira project structure, making it easy to assign your time to the right tasks. Then, Memtime syncs it back to Jira, so you have everything you need in the right place.

💰 Memtime Pricing

After a free trial, Memtime costs:

• Basic: From $10 per user/mo, you get Memtime’s automatic time tracking and reporting.
• Connect: Add in integrations and project management sync for $15 per user/mo.
• Premium: For $20 per user/mo, you get priority support and SSO login.

Everhour

Everhour’s project management focus makes it a great pairing for Jira, with everything you need to accurately track project time, budget, expenses, and invoices. With several web and mobile tracking options, it’s easy to keep tabs on your team’s time regardless of when and where they work.

🌟 Everhour’s standout features

• Simple time tracking across browsers, mobile devices, and inside commonly used apps via the browser.
• Lots of great integrations, including Asana, ClickUp, monday.com, and, of course, Jira.
• Enable teams to quote accurately with detailed financial management features for expenses, budgeting, and invoicing.
• Monitor real-time project and team progress to manage capacity, resource planning, and workloads.

🔄 How Everhour integrates with JIRA

Once online with Everhour, simply install the Jira plugin from the Atlassian marketplace to get started. From there, you can start/stop timers or log hours manually directly from the Everhour panel in Jira. You can also mark projects as billable or non-billable and run detailed time tracking reports to keep your projects on plan and within budget.

💰 Pricing

Everhour has a simple, two-tiered pricing structure:

• Free: Up to five seats for basic time tracking, projects, and tasks
• Team: For $8.50 per user/mo, get additional integrations, budgeting, and expense management features (minimum five seats required)

Timely

Timely’s automatic approach to time tracking unlocks business insights without the admin overhead of manual timesheets. Timely tracks activities as ‘memories’ before converting them into billable rates, resource forecasts, and actionable insights. It also has a range of integrations and the ability to generate professional, client-ready invoices.

🌟 Timely’s standout features

• AI-backed tracking creates timesheets automatically without manual intervention.
• ‘Memories’ sync into timesheets, projects, and team-managed workspaces to create a complete time management picture.
• ISO27001 compliance and AWS data centers ensure Timely is fast and secure.
• Lots of native developer and project management integrations, including Asana, Jira, and GitHub.

🔄 How Timely integrates with JIRA

From the Timely admin dashboard, link your Jira account and then install the Timely plugin from the Atlassian marketplace. From there, Timely will track your work creating, updating, and deleting Issues and Projects, syncing the time spent back into your Memories timeline. Note: it doesn’t sync the time back to Jira, though!

💰 Pricing

After a free trial, Timely’s pricing model looks like this:

• Starter: From $9 per user/mo for time tracking, AI assistance, and in-app support.
• Premium: From $16 per user/mo for broader team management, budgeting, and costs.
• Unlimited: From $22 per user/mo for all the Premium features, with additional time types, currencies, and integrations.

Why it’s ultimately worth integrating a time tracking app with Jira

Jira is one of the world’s best and most used project management tools. But its power lies in its ability to organize software teams, not track time. If you’re looking to get a handle on your team’s time management, Jira only has manual time tracking features that lack accuracy, automatic, and reliability.

That’s why syncing Jira with a dedicated time tracking tool is your best bet, helping you to manage your team’s productivity, improve your billing, and effectively manage your project’s budget. Without a dedicated tool, you’ll be stuck with inaccuracy and guesswork on every project you run!

Toggl Track 🤝 Jira

In our opinion, if you want seamless Jira time tracking, integrating Toggl Track is the best way to go. Not only is Toggl Track a cost-effective, beautifully designed time tracking tool, but it seamlessly integrates into Jira with a quick and easy start/stop timer that keeps development teams on track.

If you like the sound of that, why not try Toggl Track for free and see for yourself how we make time tracking in Jira a walk in the park? No credit card required!

There’s been a myth circling around for a while that it takes 21 days to form a habit. As much as we’d like that to be true — it’s not. Studies actually suggest it can take anywhere from 18–254 days to turn an activity into a habit. Quite the range, huh? 

(And no, missing one day doesn’t reset the clock back to zero, either…)

To achieve repetition over the long haul, you need to track your time and activities. Not with a pen and paper. An app will track your to-do list — or gamify the process and make it more fun! To get you started, we’ve reviewed 11 habit tracker apps to choose from for different use cases and daily routines.

The best habit tracking apps

App	Description
DailyHabits	Lets you focus on goals rather than streaks. Best for beginner habit tracking.
Loop	An open-source, customizable habit tracker. Best for tech-savvy Android users.
Toggl Track	Uses time goals to encourage consistency. Best for time tracking habits.
Habitica	Lets you challenge friends, embark on quests, and reap rewards. Best for gamified habit tracking.
Way of Life	Prioritizes custom “chains” over streaks. Best for a comprehensive and customizable tracking experience.
StickK	Uses high-stakes financial incentives to improve accountability. Best for those who need a strong motivational push.
Habitify	Fosters motivation through social challenges. Best for competition habit tracking.
Streaks	Keeps track of all the data associated with your streaks. Best for those who focus on consistency without missing a day.
Everyday	A beginner-friendly cross-platform habit tracker. Best for those just starting their habit journey.
Momentum	Offers two views for habit tracking. Best for those looking for a simple app.
Notion	Comes with a free habit tracker template as part of its productivity app. Best for those wanting full customization and are familiar with Notion.

DailyHabits

📌 DailyHabits is a simple, daily habit tracker for individuals to reach their goals.

DailyHabits encourages goals rather than streaks, so you don’t feel discouraged if you miss a day. You can use the web version for free, forever, or pay a one-time fee to access the app on your phone (Android or iPhone). 

It comes with one calendar view to visualize your month. It’s a great, basic option for beginner habit trackers. But advanced users might want more features and insights from their habit tracking app.

✅ Pros	❌ Cons
• Clean, easy-to-use interface • Can add notes to habits	• Lacks advanced features like reports, charts, and graphs • Advertises “free forever,” but users report a cost to access mobile

Pricing, plans, and platforms

There is a free-to-use web version, which the website advertises as free to use forever, but users report there is a fee to access the app. You can download DailyHabits on iOS, Android, macOS, and Windows. ​​

Apple App Store: 3.0 (4)

Loop

📌 Loop is a free habit tracker app that measures your habits on your Android or Chromebook.

Whether you want an out-of-the-box app or something you can fully customize, Loop is designed for you. More tech-savvy users can access its Github repository to modify the app. General users can still enjoy its simple interface. But since Loop lets you assign units to your habit, it may take some getting used to understanding how to calculate your different habits.

Loop lets you see your progress over time and gives you the option to skip days without losing your streak. Unfortunately, if you’re an Apple fan, Loop isn’t available. 

✅ Pros	❌ Cons
• Free to use and open source • Fully customizable	• Not available to iOS or macOS users • Learning curve to begin

Pricing, plans, and platforms

Loop is completely free and open source. It’s available on Android and Chromebooks.

Google Play Store: 4.7 (56,900+)

Toggl Track

📌 Toggl Track is a productivity app that lets you set time tracking goals to form positive habits.

Toggl Track’s time tracking goals feature revolutionizes habit tracking by letting users set daily or weekly targets linked to specific projects, tasks, or tags. You can set goals to dedicate specific hours to certain habits each day or week or limit time on bad habits like checking social media by setting a ‘less than’ target. 

Your progress is visually tracked with color-coded icons — green indicates goals met, yellow signals progress needed, and red alerts you to being behind schedule. Every time you achieve your goal, you build on your streak, encouraging you to continue your habit every day.

✅ Pros	❌ Cons
• Track unlimited time on free plan  • Has tons of integrations • Can use solo or with a team	• Not available on all platforms

Pricing, plans, and platforms

• Free: For up to five users. Comes with unlimited time tracking, integrations with 100+ tools, and exportable reports.
• Starter: From $9 per user/mo. Adds pre-populated project templates, ‌time estimates, and alerts.
• Premium: From $18 per user/mo. Includes timesheet approvals, team time tracking reminders, and scheduled report emails.
• Enterprise: Custom pricing. Comes with multiple workspaces under one organization and priority support.

Toggl Track is available on iOS and Windows.​​

G2: 4.6 (1,571), Capterra: 4.7 (2,399)

Habitica

📌 Habitica is a gamified productivity and task management app that rewards habit-building and encourages social responsibility.

Think of Habitica as the love child of task management, social media, and video games. It’s like any other habit tracker in that you can create habits, set goals, and monitor your progress. But it incorporates social responsibility and gamification to make it stand out, turning your to-do list into a role-playing game (RPG).

You can join challenges and organizations and go on quests to collaborate with other users. Since it feels like a game, it’s much more engaging and entertaining than other apps. However, individuals who aren’t prone to spending their free time gaming might find this setup complicated and unnatural.

✅ Pros	❌ Cons
• Entertaining and engaging with rewards and levels • Encourages social responsibility	• The interface may be confusing if you don’t play games • Requires an Internet connection

Pricing, plans, and platforms

• Free: Free to download the iOS or Android mobile app. 
• Subscription: From $5 per month. It allows you to “buy gems for gold” but doesn’t unlock any additional habit-tracking features. 
• Group plan: From $9 per month and $3 per month/user. Includes a shared task board and flexible accountability.

Habitica is available on iOS and Android.

Apple App Store: 4.0 (2,000+), Google Play Store: 4.7 (55,300+)

Way of Life

📌 Way of Life is a habit tracking tool full of data and trends to monitor your progress.

Sometimes, it’s a little more complicated than “Yes, I did my habit today” or “No, I didn’t.” And missing a day can feel like a setback that discourages you from sticking with the habit at all. Way of Life keeps your motivation up because you can “skip” habits and even add journal entries about each one. 

You can also create your own custom “chains” rather than streaks to break habits down into more manageable chunks. This might look like setting a goal to complete a productive hobby for three days in a row and then taking a break. This way, you don’t feel like you failed when you skip a day. Way of Life gives you plenty of ways to analyze your data, but the Premium plan may be too pricey for users looking for a simple habit tracker.

✅ Pros	❌ Cons
• “Chains” instead of streaks make habits more approachable • Great selection of data, charts, and trends	• Pricier than other options • App appears to work better on iOS than Android

Pricing, plans, and platforms

• Free: Free to download the mobile apps. 
• Premium: from $4.99 per user/mo. Adds the ability to archive habits and track more habits.

Way of Life is available on iOS and Android.

Apple App Store: 4.8 (4,500+), Google Play Store: 3.5 (1,100+)

stickK

📌 stickK keeps you accountable by using your own money as a high-stakes motivation for habit-building.

If you’re having trouble sticking to your routine, maybe the stakes aren’t high enough. When you sign up for stickK, you sign a Commitment Contract. If you don’t stick to your habits, you lose money (but stickK donates this to charity).

stickK is another community-driven habit tracker. You can see other users who share your habits and get inspired by their success or learn from their struggles. Keep in mind that stickK can be extremely pricey, and both iOS and Android users often report sluggish performance and login issues.

✅ Pros	❌ Cons
• Community features • High stakes encourage users to keep up their habit	• App is extremely buggy • Very pricey

Pricing, plans, and platforms

• Basic: Free for 25 users per Commitment (can unlock unlimited users for $10 per month). Supports one campaign and two Commitments. 
• All-Access: From $19 per month. Supports 100 users per Commitment. Adds three campaigns and four Commitments per campaign.
• Pro: From $99 per month. Supports 250 users per Commitment. Includes unlimited campaigns and unlimited Commitments per campaign.

StickK is available on iOS and Android.

Apple App Store: 2.7 (22), Google Play Store: 2.8 (345)

Habitify

📌 Habitify is a cross-platform habit tracker app that offers social challenges, integrations, and extensive organizational features.

If you’re up for a little friendly competition, you can challenge your friends (or play along with strangers) to social challenges. This is a great feature for those who need some extra motivation. Habitify also comes with some of the best organizational capabilities, letting you sort your habits into different categories and group them together by relevance.

Habitify is a subscription model that some individuals might be put off by. But it might be worth it thanks to its advanced features and integrations. You can connect Habitify to your Apple Health or Google Fit to automatically mark off health-related habits.   

✅ Pros	❌ Cons
• Integrates with Apple Health/Google Fit • Functions great on all devices	• Subscription model pricing • Free version features are limited and run out quickly

Pricing, plans, and platforms

• Free: Free forever. Comes with three habits and cross-platform sync. 
• Premium: From $2.49 per month. Adds unlimited habits, calendar integrations, and advanced reminders.

Habitify is available on iOS, Android, and macOS. ​​

Apple App Store: 4.5 (670+), Google Play Store: 4.2 (4,800+)

Streaks

📌 Streaks is an Apple-friendly to-do list app that motivates users with ongoing streaks.

If you’re an iPhone or Mac user driven by the thrill of maintaining a lengthy daily streak, then Streaks was practically made for you. It’s great for users tracking physical habits because it’s compatible with your Apple Watch and even integrates with your device’s health app.

To focus on consistency, Streaks gives you a lot of stats associated with your habits and the option for home screen widgets. You can check out your weekly and monthly success rate percentages. But if you’re planning on tracking a lot of habits, note there’s a limit of 24 habits, even on the paid plan.

✅ Pros	❌ Cons
• One-time purchase • Lots of data associated with your streak	• Not available on Android • No option for unlimited habits

Pricing, plans, and platforms

It costs $5.99 one-time to download the app on iOS or macOS.

Apple App Store: 4.8 (1,400+)

Everyday

📌 Everyday is a straightforward, visual habit tracker that encourages discipline through daily habits.

Simplicity is at the heart of Everyday. You’ll see your habits on the left and the date across the top. The longer your streak, the darker the color. Any interruptions will look like white boxes. 

As the name suggests, Everyday encourages daily habit tracking. Its engaging visuals help users track their progress. As a beginner-friendly, cross-platform app, it’s a standout choice, though the free version limits you to tracking just three habits.

✅ Pros	❌ Cons
• Beginner-friendly interface • Appealing visuals	• Max of three free habits • Yearly subscription or costly one-time purchase

Pricing, plans, and platforms

• Free: Includes up to three habits and unlimited data storage. 
• Premium: From $2.50 per month. Comes with unlimited habits and habits insights.
• Lifetime: One-time $99 purchase. Includes all Premium features, forever, and priority support.

Everyday is available on iOS, Android, and macOS.​​

Apple App Store: 4.7 (1,100+), Google Play Store: 4.6 (3,700+)

Momentum

📌 Momentum is an iOS habit tracker that keeps you on track with your monthly habits. 

Momentum has a simple interface, offering you two view options. You can see a calendar view or a view of all your habits. When you complete a habit, the calendar day turns green. 

If you struggle with time management, you’ll enjoy Momentum’s integration with Google Calendar. This way, you can make time for your habits right within your productivity tools. It’s not available for Android and offers in-app purchases.

✅ Pros	❌ Cons
• Simple interface	• Only available on iOS • Subscription-based model

Pricing, plans, and platforms

• App download: Free to download the app. 
• Subscription: from $1.99 per month. Unlocks in-app features.

Momentum is currently available on iOS and Mac. ​​

Notion

📌 Notion is a productivity app with a free habit tracking template so you can customize your daily tasks.

While not strictly a habit tracking app, Notion is a powerful tool that offers a habit tracker template. This way, you can customize your view to your liking, promoting healthy habits to keep up your current streaks. 

Notion offers a free, fully customizable habit tracking experience. Add unlimited habits and tailor your view to suit your preferences perfectly. If you’ve never used Notion before, you might find it confusing and opt for a dedicated free habit tracker.

✅ Pros	❌ Cons
• Weekly view and card view of habits • Fully customizable	• More complex to set up

Pricing, plans, and platforms

• Free: Includes invitations to up to 10 guests, collaborative workspace, and integrations. 
• Plus: From $12 per user/mo. Adds up to 100 guests, unlimited blocks, and unlimited file uploads.
• Business: From $18 per user/mo. Comes with up to 250 guests and private team spaces.
• Enterprise: Contact sales for pricing. Adds audit log and workspace analytics.

Notion is available on iOS, Android, macOS, and Windows. ​​

G2: 4.7 (5,872), Capterra: 4.7 (2,405)

What to look for in any great habit tracker app

Not all habit trackers are created equal, which is great news because everyone has their own personal preferences. But any worthwhile habit tracker app should have the following:

• 💆 User-friendly: You should be able to open up a great habit tracker app and instantly figure out where to go, what to do, and how to track your progress. A well-designed app swiftly adds, tracks, and reviews habits with ease, so you can focus on building habits rather than figuring out how to use the app.
• ⚙️ Customization: When you can tailor habit tracking to your personal preferences, you’re more likely to keep using the app and continue your habit streak. Find an app that lets you pick and choose the habits you want to focus on, set reminders that sync with your daily rhythm, and express your style with color themes.
• 🔌 Integrations: A great habit tracker app plays well with others, syncing seamlessly with your calendar, fitness apps, and even timeboxing apps. These integrations are a must so you can save time and have a holistic view of your habits and how they fit into your life.
• 🏆 Motivational features: Who doesn’t want their own personal cheerleader making every small win feel like a genuine, rewarding achievement? Apps that come with streaks celebrate your consistency, earning rewards helps you achieve milestones, and social sharing lets you inspire and be inspired by others.
• 📊 Data insights and analytics: Actionable insights based on data help you truly understand your habits and their impact. By identifying patterns (good or bad), you can tweak your routines and continue on the path toward continuous improvement.
• 🎯 Goal setting and progress tracking: When you define specific, overarching goals, it’s important to monitor your advancement and keep your spirits high. Breaking down larger objectives into manageable tasks helps you maintain clarity and focus, making even the most ambitious goals feel achievable.
• 🔔 Reminders and alerts: Even the most determined individuals can struggle with accountability, so investing in an app that sends timely reminders and notifications is helpful. Whether it’s a gentle reminder to drink water, a prompt to exercise, or an alert to wind down before bed, these features help you stay consistent with even your most simple habits.

Tips for habit building

If you want to form positive habits or get rid of bad habits, you need strategies in place. Here are our top tips, designed to help beginners and experts alike build better habits.

Start small and be consistent

Great achievements take time, and so do lasting habits! Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither are habits. They take patience and persistence. Start with small, manageable habits to gain momentum and avoid feeling overwhelmed. And stay consistent with these small habits (trust us; it’s the key to habit formation). It’s better to do a little each day than attempt too much and give up. 

Small habits might look like easy-to-do daily actions, like spending 15 minutes each day reading a book. As you build this habit, you can start to increase its duration. Take things slowly, and even give the Getting Things Done framework a whirl to stay disciplined.

Identify and overcome obstacles

Habit building isn’t as easy as it sounds (otherwise, there wouldn’t be so many great apps dedicated to helping you on this journey). Time constraints, lack of motivation, and inconsistency all hinder the process, so start by anticipating these challenges early on. For example, if time is a concern, consider time blocking and dedicate a specific chunk of time each day to your habit.

Or, if you find yourself lacking motivation, try setting reminders or pairing new habits with activities you already enjoy. For example, if reading after a long day feels daunting, brew a cup of your favorite tea or grab your favorite beverage to sip alongside your book.

Celebrate progress and stay motivated

Celebrate all your victories — big and small. By acknowledging and rewarding small victories, you reinforce positive behavior, boost your morale, and make the journey enjoyable!

Consider treating yourself to a favorite meal or activity, reflecting on your achievements, sharing your wins with others, or creating a visual reminder of your progress. Each celebration propels you forward, turning habit-building into a rewarding process.

Build good habits with Toggl Track

Remember, when choosing a habit tracker, it’s important to take your time and make sure it ticks all your boxes. Whether you value features, integrations, or cross-platform functionality, carefully consider which app aligns best with your needs.

Toggl Track shines with its sleek, intuitive interface and standout features like Toggl Track Goals. This makes habit-building easy, so you can boost your productivity and establish the perfect, consistent routine. Try Toggl Track for free to start tracking and building good habits!

Timely is a popular time-tracking tool that leverages AI to automatically log and track time without you lifting a finger. With 100% automated tracking, detailed reporting, visual timelines, and several integrations, it’s a solid choice for many companies looking to improve productivity.

But is Timely the right fit for you? Some users find its AI-driven automation challenging to adjust to, while others feel it doesn’t actually end up saving them that much time in the end. If you’re curious about what other options, you’re in the right place. Are you and Timely a match made in heaven, or was it just not meant to be? Read on to find out.

Best Timely alternatives at-a-glance

Tool	G2 Rating	Description
Toggl Track	4.6	A powerful and flexible time tracking tool, best for boosting employee productivity and profitability.
Clockify	4.5	A free time tracking software providing billable and non-billable hour tracking and reporting, best for teams needing a basic solution.
TimeCamp	4.7	Automatic time and billable hour tracking, best for small to medium businesses and freelancers needing seamless integrations with project management tools.
Time Doctor	4.4	A comprehensive real-time time tracking and productivity tool, best for remote teams looking to monitor employee performance and ensure accountability.
Everhour	4.7	Seamless integration with project management tools like Asana and Trello. Best for less tab switching and more deep work.
Hubstaff	4.5	Time tracking with GPS and geofencing, ideal for remote and field teams needing accountability. Best for distributed workforces requiring detailed productivity insights.
RescueTime	4.1	A beast for personal productivity improvement, this automatic time management app tracks time spent on digital activities. It’s best for those wanting to improve focus and build better work habits.
DeskTime	4.5	URL tracking and employee productivity tool, best for a detailed look into where your team’s time goes.
BigTime	4.5	An all-in-one offering project management, time tracking, and billing tools, best for bigger consulting or accounting firms that need streamlined operations.
Paymo	4.6	End-to-end project management with time tracking, invoicing, and task management. Best for small agencies and freelancers requiring a 2-in-1 time and project tracking solution.

1. Toggl Track

Toggl Track is an easy-to-use time tracking software tool and a top alternative to Timely. Your team can track time using a simple timer, browser extensions, mobile and desktop apps, native integrations, or even add time entries manually.

Its desktop apps also offer automated time tracking. Running in the background, the app tracks your work activities privately (i.e., they’re not shared with your colleagues or manager). Once you’re ready, you can upload selected activities as time entries.

While Toggl Track simplifies time tracking, it also offers powerful and customizable profitability insights and time reports. Using the new Analytics feature, you can slice and dice your team’s time data any way you like using custom charts, tables, and dashboards.

G2: 4.6 (1,571), Capterra: 4.7 (2,404)

✅ What we like	❓What’s missing
Toggl Track is not only an intuitive time tracker. It’s also a time analytics tool that provides detailed insights into your tracked time.	Toggl Track does not offer any surveillance features—that’s by design. We believe employee monitoring and micromanagement feel invasive and create trust issues without offering any real productivity benefits.

Toggl Track is best for any type of professional team that wants an easy-to-use time-tracking and reporting tool. 

Top features

• One-click timer: Start and stop tracking your work with a single click.
• Automated time tracking: Track time spent on all work activities privately. When you’re ready, upload selected activities as time entries to Toggl Track.
• Calendar view: Visualize your tasks, appointments, and milestones on a calendar and get a clear overview of your day or month at a glance.
• 100+ integrations: Seamlessly connect with over a hundred popular tools and platforms to avoid switching between multiple web, Windows, or Mac apps.
• Project dashboard: Get a centralized hub to monitor all your projects’ progress, estimated vs. actual budget, and labor cost details.
• Insights: Dive deep into analytics and data to understand real-time profitability trends, areas of improvement, and overall performance.

Toggl Track vs. Timely

Feature	Toggl Track	Timely
Automation	Provides an Autotracker on the desktop app that runs in the background to record your activity on a timeline. This information is private to each user.	Has a stack of AI tools for tracking logged and idle time. Plus, an AI Assistant for categorizing activities and scheduling work.
Time tracker	Automatic, manual, or Pomodoro	Automatic in the background
Integrations	Over 100 integrations with the most popular SaaS tools plus an API	15 native integrations with project management tools
Reporting	Reports on business metrics like ROI, projects, profitability, etc. Offers Time Audits to spot tracking inconsistencies, an Insight hub to spot data trends and time sinks, and Analytics to visualize data with custom dashboards.	Reports on user work patterns, logged time, and unbilled hours. Supports custom dashboard

Why customers love it

One user shared, “I like that I can easily access it on the computer and/or my phone on the app. It is user-friendly. It also helps me stay on track, and I can run reports and categorize what I’ve been working on. I use it every day.”

“I use Toggl Track every working day, and I find it quick and easy to log time to each client throughout the day,” says programmer Mike M.

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Free	$0	Personal use
Starter	$9 per user/month	Teams with basic time tracking need
Premium	$20 per user/month	Teams needing online and offline functionality for tracking time and profitability
Enterprise	Custom pricing	Enterprise teams needing custom solutions (we can build it for you!)

2. Clockify

Clockify is a simple, easy-to-use time tracking solution. It lets you track projects and tasks across web, desktop, and mobile devices with one simple interface. Clockify is a great choice for those with basic and budget-friendly time tracking needs. Create time sheets or track attendance in just a few clicks.

G2 : 4.5 (173), Capterra: 4.8 (9,115)

✅ What we like	❓What’s missing
Clockify’s auto tracker tracks websites and apps you use for more than ten seconds and creates personalized records. You can then easily create timesheets based on these activities.	With Clockify’s free plan, you can’t track time off or schedule projects and don’t have access to project templates. Also, Clockify offers surveillance features, including screenshots and GPS tracking. This may feel invasive to some team members.

Clockify is best for teams who want an affordable but comprehensive tool for tracking time and monitoring employee productivity. 

Top features

• Productivity and attendance tracking: Monitor your team’s efficiency and ensure they’re present at work.
• Weekly timesheets: Easily record and access work hours to streamline payroll and accountability.
• Calendar timeline: Get a visual overview of how your team spends time so you can manage resources efficiently. 
• Employee monitoring: Timely tracks your team’s location and takes random screenshots when the clock is on.

Clockify vs. Timely

Feature	Clockify	Timely
Time tracking	Manual start-stop timer you have to remember to turn on and off yourself	100% automatic time tracking
AI features	No	Yes
Free version	Yes	No
Employee monitoring	Allows optional screenshots	No spying, but does track activity automatically

Why customers love it

Bailey E., a small business accountant, said, “It helps me keep track of time and ensure that I am very efficient and do my best work while on the job.”

As another user from the financial services industry put it, “Clockify makes it simple to synchronize our projects and activities across platforms by leveraging integrations with other development tools. Technical support is one area that needs improvement.”

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Basic	$4.99 per user/month	Solo users with basic time tracking needs
Standard	$6.99 per user/month	Small teams with more complex time-tracking needs
Pro	$9.99 per user/month	Teams needing very robust project and time tracking
Enterprise	$14.99 per user/month	Complex client projects that require advanced time-tracking features

3. TimeCamp

TimeCamp is designed to eliminate manual work. It does so much more than just tracking time — like managing invoicing, budget management, and profitability analysis. With features like billable hours tracking and one-click invoicing, it simplifies workflows and optimizes project efficiency. TimeCamp stands out with its “time entry approval” feature, ensuring billing accuracy for agencies and freelancers.

G2: 4.7 (335), Capterra: 4.7 (598)

✅ What we like	❓What’s missing
TimeCamp offers 20+ built-in reports, including attendance, time off, overtime, project budgets, and expense reports.	TimeCamp surveillance features like screenshots and website tracking can feel intrusive to employees and negatively impact their productivity.

TimeCamp is best for teams seeking an automatic time tracker with profitability and productivity insights.

Top features

• Keyword-based time tracking: Assign specific keywords to automate time tracking. When you use them, TimeCamp matches your time entry to the right task.
• Task management and project tracking: Generate detailed time records to schedule work and resources efficiently. 
• Profitability analysis: Get a clear overview of how profitable your team and projects are. 
• Invoicing: Easily create invoices, track billable time, and access historical billing rates. 

TimeCamp vs. Timely

Feature	TimeCamp	Timely
Customer support	Email, Knowledge base, 24/7 chat	Email, Knowledge base, phone access and FAQ Forum from other users
Training	Documentation, live online, or in-person options	Email, Knowledge base, phone access, and FAQ Forum from other users
Free plan	Yes	No, just a 14-day free trial

Why customers love it

“There isn’t time wasted figuring out how to log my time even when the application or site is updated with new features or a new look—you can get to where you want to go very quickly again,” says Ivan W., an IT Consultant for a small business.

Small business owner Lazar P. echoed the feeling, “Timecamp is easy to use. I use it daily in my work, including various features like reporting. Implementation and integration into the business was fairly seamless.”

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Free	$0 per user	Freelancers
Starter	$3.99 per user	Small teams and start-ups
Premium	$6.99 per user	Growing teams
Ultimate	$10.99 per user	Mid-sized teams
Enterprise	Custom pricing	Large enterprises

4. Time Doctor

Time Doctor is a robust productivity tool decked out with activity monitoring and distraction alerts. Employers can use the screen monitoring feature and detailed productivity reports to understand where inefficiencies arise in their team’s workday. Time Doctor’s focus on real-time insights and accountability makes it ideal for organizations trying to maximize efficiency.

G2: 4.4 (385), Capterra: 4.5 (532)

✅ What we like	❓What’s missing
Time Doctor lets you track time per client, task, or project. Choose how you want to log time for more accurate records.	Time Doctor’s approach to employee time tracking comes with a heap of monitoring features like recording random screenshots of the user’s screen and silent tracking. These features can feel invasive and lower team morale.

Time Doctor is best for teams that need a tool to track time accurately and improve employee productivity. But only if the surveillance features aren’t an issue.

Top features

• Productivity analysis: Get in-depth productivity insights to improve your employee’s work habits.
• Offline tracking: Ensure every activity gets logged, even when not online.
• Automated time logging: Minimize the need for manual data entry so your team can focus on their work. 
• Employee monitoring: Time Doctor takes random screenshots and tracks time silently whenever your computer is on.

Time Doctor vs. Timely

Feature	Time Doctor	Timely
Time tracking	Manual, less efficient, and accurate	Automatic, more efficient, 100% accurate
Billing and invoicing	Yes	No
Offline time tracking	Yes	No

What customers love it

“100% your best buddy if you have a WFH work setup. Will detect any malicious activity like if an employee is trying to game the system,” —Roxanne Marie V., Brand Operations Manager.

John P., Regional Platforms Lead, says, “It gives us an overview of the whole Customer Service operation in terms of agent performance: productivity, attendance, idle time, and productive hours.”

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Basic	$6.70 per user/month	Small teams and start-ups
Standard	$11.70 per user/month	Mid-sized teams with complex tasks
Premium	$16.70 per user/month	Large hybrid teams
Enterprise	Custom pricing	Large multinationals

5. Everhour

Everhour is a project management tool first and a time tracker second. It basically works like an extension that embeds itself into tools like Asana or Trello to measure how much time you spend on different tasks. Everhour also offers comprehensive budget tracking and detailed reporting, making it perfect for teams focused on collaborative project management.

G2: 4.7 (174), Capterra: 4.7 (426)

✅ What we like	❓What’s missing
Everhour’s free plan includes unlimited time tracking, projects, and reports. In addition, the paid plans offer team management features for resource planning, time off, and expense management.	It’s not built with different time zones in mind, which makes it challenging for distributed teams.

Teams using Asana needing seamless time tracking built into the project management and collaboration tool.

Top features

• Budgeting and forecasting: Helps manage budgets and predict future costs.

• Invoicing and payroll: Automatically creates invoices and calculates payroll.
• Task and project management: Organizes tasks within projects for easy tracking.
• Team availability tracking: Monitors who’s available and who’s not.

Everhour vs. Timely

Feature	Everhour	Timely
Platforms supported	Only available as a web page	Available as a desktop and mobile time tracking app on iOS and Android
Billing and invoicing	Yes	No
Native task and project management	Yes	No

Why customers love it

“Everhour is a well-designed, easy-to-use, powerful time-tracking tool that has one of the most unique integrations with several key SaaS productivity tools. It seamlessly flows into the UI of apps like Asana and Notion in ways that enhance the experience for both apps,” says DJ C., a small business founder.

Fellow founder Joel S. agrees, “If you are an Asana user, just get this tool. It will vastly simplify your life!”

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Free	$0 per user	Freelancers and small teams
Team	$10 per user	Mid to large teams with complex time-tracking requirements.

6. Hubstaff

Hubstaff Time is part of a larger suite of SaaS tools, including a hiring and project management tool. It is the ultimate employee monitoring software, offering both URL and screenshot tracking, as well as automated time entries. It’s an easy-to-use time tracking solution that gives employers lots of visibility — perhaps too much in our opinion (as we mentioned, we’re very anti-surveillance).

G2: 4.5 (1,275), Capterra: 4.6 (1,504)

✅ What we like	❓What’s missing
Automatic timesheet approval, lots of integrations, and built-in payroll for seamless billing	Real-time tracking feels intrusive, and there is no free plan, just a 14-day free trial.

Hubstaff is a decent option for smaller teams looking for a low-admin employee monitoring tool.

Top features

• Real-time tracking: Measures time and productivity metrics with screenshots, app usage, and activity rates.
• GPS and geofencing: Ideal for mobile teams who work between the field and the office.
• Payroll and invoicing: Built-in payroll integrations for simplified payments and invoicing.
• Project management: Task management and budgeting tools to streamline projects.

Hubstaff vs. Timely

Feature	Hubstaff	Timely
Overtime calculation	No	Yes, it’s one of the key features!
Employee monitoring	Yes, via both URL and screenshot tracking	No, no spyware here
Offline time tracking	Yes	No

Why customers love it

Marketing strategist Diana P. is a big fan, “It’s the most reliable tool to maintain transparency between remote workers and employers. I love it!!! I wish I had it in my older jobs, it’s so easy to use!”

Agatha C., who works in customer success, finds it helps her stay productive, “I like Hubstaff because it makes tracking time and productivity so efficient, helping me keep projects organized and ensuring accountability.”

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Free	$0	Freelancers
Starter	$7 per user/month	Start-ups
Grow	$9 per user/month	Fast-growing small teams
Team	$12 per user/month	Mid to large teams with complex needs
Enterprise	Contact Hubstaff for prices, starting at $25 per user/month	Enterprise organizations

7. RescueTime

RescueTime focuses on personal productivity. It tracks how you spend your time on devices, identifying inefficiencies and giving you actionable insights. It stands out with its real-time focus alerts and goal-setting options that help you stay on track. RescueTime is quite unique — it prioritizes personal growth, making it great for those who want to improve focus and work habits.

G2: 4.1 (90), Capterra: 4.6 (139)

✅ What we like	❓What’s missing
There’s no need to fuss with starting or stopping, as RescueTime does the tracking independently. Unlike other tools that offer time tracking features, RescueTime focuses on improving productivity.	RescueTime is only available via the web page at the moment. No desktop or mobile app can make the experience feel more limiting than with other tools.

RescueTime is best for individuals looking to improve their work habits and productivity.

Top features

• Automated and manual time tracking: Get flexibility in both automatic tracking and manual input and log work hours accurately. 
• Daily summaries: Each workday, you get a recap that shows your team’s main tasks and time spent to keep you in the loop.
• Third-party integrations: RescueTime works with many other tools to help your workflows run smoothly. Third-party apps include project management and communication apps. 
• Focus time: Set Focus Time sessions for as long as you need to block distracting websites and improve productivity. 

RescueTime vs. Timely

Feature	RescueTime	Timely
Customer training	None	Documentation, webinars, live online, in person
Project cost management	No	Yes
Employee monitoring	Yes	No

Why customers love it

“Rescue time has evolved a lot over the years. Along the way, their support and focus on making my workday more efficient have been consistent and outstanding.” —Geoffrey T., Senior CS Manager

“I can track my time in every app and also category what type of software I am using and set a target for a week. Every weekend, I get a proper mail regarding how I utilized my time in the previous week and tips for the next week.” —Jamruddin S., IT Trainer

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Lite	$0 per user	First-time time tracking tool users
Premium	$12 per user	Teams with tight deadlines

8. DeskTime

DeskTime is a time-tracking and productivity tool designed to enhance efficiency and work-life balance. It offers automatic time tracking and features like productivity analysis and employee scheduling. DeskTime’s Pomodoro timer comes with break reminders to protect well-being and prevent burnout. It’s ideal for any team that wants to cultivate a healthy work environment.

G2: 4.5 (321), Capterra: 4.6 (526)

✅ What we like	❓What’s missing
It makes time tracking a breeze, improves efficiency, and is helpful and easy to use while promoting wellbeing at work.	Software bugs have been reported, along with inaccurate tracking after a certain period of time. App performance has also been criticized, requiring refreshes after being left idle.

DeskTime is best for teams that want an all-in-one employee monitoring tool with many time management features and affordable forms.

Top features

• Automatic time tracking: No manual input is required for tracking work hours.
• Productivity analysis: Generates reports showing productive versus unproductive time.
• Project tracking: Teams can assign tasks and monitor time spent efficiently.
• URL tracking: Automatically tracks all computer activity. With higher-tier plans, employers can also get access to screenshot features that allow them to see their employees’ screens.

DeskTime vs. Timely

Feature	DeskTime	Timely
Free plan	Yes	No
Attendance tracking	Yes	No
Billing and invoicing	Yes	No
Offline time tracking	Yes	No

Why customers love it

Vikesh A. says, “Writing this after using two years of continuous services, this feature helps you stay organized and easily track time spent. They should have more dashboards or analytics related to monitor the absence or presence of team members.”

Laura G., accountant and project manager, says, “Desktime organizes your work schedule and evaluate which are your most productive hours, so in the future you can control your time better.”

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Free	$0	Freelancers
Starter	$7 per user/month	Start-ups
Grow	$9 per user/month	Fast-growing small teams
Team	$12 per user/month	Mid to large teams with complex needs
Enterprise	Contact Hubstaff for prices, starting at $25 per user/month	Enterprise organizations

9. BigTime

BigTime is the Swiss army knife of time trackers. It covers time tracking, billing, project management, and resource management and is best suited to larger professional service companies like accounting, consulting, or IT firms. Its real strength lies in its ability to provide granular insights into project profitability and resource allocation. The cherry on top? Its integrations with QuickBooks make end-to-end financial management seamless.

G2: 4.5 (1,405) , Capterra: 4.6 (647)

✅ What we like	❓What’s missing
BigTime is really good at eliminating a lot of the manual work associated with project and expense tracking.	Unfortunately, it is not available on Linux and comes with a steep learning curve.

As the name (sort of) suggests, BigTime is better-suited for big firms with complex and comprehensive workflow needs encompassing time tracking, project management, and finances.

Top features

• Time tracking: Measure both billable and non-billable hours or customize your timesheet.
• Expense tracking: Keep tabs on mileage and other expenses thanks to handy alerts and notifications.
• Full-cycle project management: resource allocation, payment processing, and reporting all in one!
• Integrations: With several common SaaS tools like Salesforce, Jira, Slack, and more.

BigTime vs. Timely

Feature	BigTime	Timely
Public API	Yes	No
24/7 live support	Yes	No
Available on Chromebook	Yes	No

Why customers love it

“I’ve been using BigTime software to streamline my billing, invoicing, and time tracking, and it has truly been a game changer. What was once a major headache is now handled effortlessly.” —Baris R., Project manager for civil engineers.

“It strikes an excellent balance of being clean, simple, and intuitive—while being highly customizable, thorough, and detailed. The implementation team was incredible. The whole process was incredibly professional—we were very impressed.” —Anon employee at a small architecture business

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Essential	$20 per user/month	Simple, smaller teams
Avanced	$35 per user/month	Anyone managing international currencies
Premiere	$45 per user/month	Larger teams with multi-level approvals
Foresight	Custom pricing	Complex enterprise clients

10. Paymo

Paymo is an intuitive 3-in-1 combo of task management, time tracking, and invoicing, making it ideal for teams managing multiple projects. Paymo boasts a Gantt chart feature, which offers a clear visual of project timelines and dependencies. It also supports resource scheduling and client collaboration, making it perfect for creative agencies and freelancers.

G2: 4.6 (588), Capterra: 4.7 (690)

✅ What we like	❓What’s missing
It offers a user-friendly interface while maintaining comprehensive project management tools and invoicing & budgeting features. Plus, you get big discounts if you pay annually!	Paymo has fewer integrations than other tools. There’s also no offline mobile access, and users complain about limited features. It can get quite expensive for larger teams.

Paymo is a great alternative to Timely (and other time tracking tools) if you’re a freelancer or small team looking for essential financial and invoicing features.

Top features

• Invoicing: Customizable invoices with expense tracking for billing clients.
• Project management: Comprehensive tools for planning, scheduling, and managing tasks.
• Task tracking and management: Organize tasks with deadlines, priorities, and assignments.
• Mobile apps: Track time and manage projects on the go with mobile access.

Paymo vs. Timely

Feature	Paymo	Timely
Public API	Yes	No
Project management functionality	Offers Kanban boards, Gantt charts, and project management, planning, and tracking features	No
Overtime calculation	No	Yes

Why customers love it

“I like the way Paymo has been designed. With its straightforward menu sidebar, it’s easy to access everything your business needs quickly and easily,”—Jamie Lee J., Sales Manager

Charlie H. echoes the sentiment, “Paymo is very easy to use and easy to set up, it’s a time savior spent on my different clients, perfect price/quality ratio, and its customer support is great and very helpful.”

Pricing

Plan	Cost	Best for
Free	Free	Small teams starting out with time tracking
Starter	$3.90 per user/month	Small teams needing collaboration tools and basic time management
Small Office	$6.90 per user/month	Small companies with project management needs
Business	$10.90 per user/month	Medium-sized businesses needing full Gantt chart functionality

How we chose this list of Timely alternatives

This list didn’t manifest out of thin air. We hand-picked the best Timely alternatives based on several different time tracking criteria. We then compared each tool against some of the best employee time tracking software available today to ensure a balanced review. How?

• We combed through hundreds of software user reviews and feedback to see what real people had to say.
• We double-checked each tool to see how the time-tracking features stack up against each other. For example, ease of use, native integrations, scalability, manual vs. automated tracking, pricing, etc.
• We even tested them ourselves to experience them firsthand in different use cases and check if they really align with the best practices in time tracking.

Why do users switch from Timely?

Timely itself is a solid time tracking tool. It is AI-powered, and automatically tracks and logs your work activities. This is great since it eliminates the need for manual entries, increasing accuracy and giving you one less thing to think about during a busy workday.

Standout features include its ease-of-use and Memories (an AI that runs in the background, logging all your tasks, apps, websites, and documents to build a detailed record of your day with zero manual input).

Timely offers three pricing plans without a free version:

• Starter: From $10 per user/mo
• Premium: From $20 per user/mo
• Unlimited: From $28 per user/mo

Pros: Easy to use, automatic tracking, detailed reporting
Cons: Higher cost for bigger teams, limited manual time entry, can take time to adjust to its automation

G2: 4.8 (419), Capterra: 4.7 (702)

With such great community scores, what makes people want to break up with their Timely subscriptions? According to our research, there are a few reasons that keep coming up:

• Firstly, it is simply too expensive for many solo freelancers with simpler timekeeping needs, especially with other more affordable options on the market.
• Tracking time against tasks in Timely costs extra. Users must purchase a $5 per user per month add-on to access a task timer. 
• It has fewer integrations than tools with similar pricing, such as Toggl Track or Clockify. Also, some integrations are only available on higher price tiers.
• You can’t create custom charts and dashboards to analyze tracked time data in Timely. 
• To generate invoices with Timely, you must pay $20 per user per month for the QuickBooks Online integration. 
• Automatic tracking is great, but limited flexibility isn’t. It would be nice to have the option to include a manual track with a stop/start timer (time spent on client phone calls, for example) or to override something if it goes wrong.
• Some users have claimed they saw their timesheet reporting become less accurate with Timely, with one person saying, “We saw, in a systematic (larger) way, that our timesheets became, in fact, less accurate. Some people in our organization started slacking on writing the timesheets because they felt they had all the historical data in Timely and could do it whenever, even months later. What we observed is that when using Timely, you end up leaving it up to an AI model that doesn’t really know what you did to create your timesheets. At some level, it becomes random.” —Simen A. W. O., CEO.
• A few users have also commented their Memories are not getting logged when they should be, which causes issues if they forget to manually check their logs at the end of the day (defeating the purpose of an automatic timer…). As one user put it, “Some team members experience glitches with the memory feature that tracks what we’re doing. We’ve realized that depending on the amount of tabs you have open, it may not track accurately becasue of it’s overload. We do wish there was a feature for limits of individual team members’ hours for projects.”

What to look for in a Timely alternative

This will depend on your specific needs. You may need to track task time, generate invoices, or access lots of integrations. Here are some general things to look out for:

• Cost: Look for alternatives that fit your budget. Whether you want a free version, a one-time purchase, or a low monthly fee, make sure it offers good value for the price.
• Features and integrations: The alternative should offer all the features you need. Check for integrations with other apps or software you regularly use.
• User experience: Look for software with good reviews about its ease of use and minimal technical glitches.
• Time-saving: You want to make sure your time tracker is actually, you know, saving you time!

Get started with a free time tracking tool

Toggl Track is the best Timely alternative, offering more functionality at a better price, with the same simplicity.

Firstly, track time as you please, with automatic time tracking, start/stop timer, and manual time entry options. This flexibility empowers employees to manage their time however suits them best. Timely, on the other hand, forces automatic time tracking, which is only possible on desktop apps.

With 100+ integrations and a browser extension, Toggl Track lets employees track time in any app on any device. Entries sync in real-time, enabling you to keep track on the go.

Time tracking goals make it easy to improve accountability and cultivate a time tracking habit, which helps newbies get into the swing of things. Employees can set the goals themselves, or their team lead can set them for them.

Comprehensive and customizable reports and analytics give managers deep insights into employee productivity, engagement, and accountability without any surveillance monitoring.

Go on… cheat on your regular, and sign up for a free account with Toggl Track. What’s the harm in taking a peek?

It’s another workday. You sign in to your computer…and so does your boss, silently observing your typing speed and blink rate via the webcam.

This may sound downright creepy, but it’s the unfortunate reality for many remote and hybrid workers. 80% feel monitored by their employers, and about the same number of employers have some type of activity tracking in place.

At Toggl, we strongly oppose employee surveillance. It’s ethically unacceptable, legally concerning, and, worst of all — severely damaging to companies and their people.

Yet, employee monitoring software is a booming billion-dollar market, and Toggl’s 2025 Productivity Index revealed that 70% of leaders are comfortable using surveillance software in a remote work setting.

So, how did we get to a state where companies distrust their employees and cultivate productivity paranoia? Let’s unpack this.

TL;DR — Key Takeaways

• Over 550 employee monitoring products now offer employee surveillance technologies, such as keystroke logging, screen recordings, webcam monitoring, and GPS tracking. 

• These technologies erode trust and invade privacy and often have the opposite effect — they actually reduce productivity, increase disengagement, and lead to higher turnover. One in six workers consider monitoring technology usage a good reason to quit a job. 

• Excessive monitoring often breaches data privacy laws like GDPR, ECPA, and CCPA, with regulators taking action against companies that overstep boundaries. 

• There are better ways to manage employee performance, such as collaborative goal-setting, data-driven capacity planning, promoting deep work, and providing regular feedback. These approaches focus on building trust and intrinsic motivation rather than instilling fear via surveillance. 

• Toggl Track believes transparency and trust are the crux to higher workforce productivity and better operational performance. 

• To increase workforce productivity, employers should channel more effort into improving their visibility into teams’ workloads and available capacities. Try new work schedule strategies and continuously course-correct via internal employee feedback. 

The rise in employee monitoring

As more teams moved from cubicles to home offices, a new term emerged — bossware.

Also known as electronic employee monitoring software, bossware refers to the expanding means companies have to monitor employees’ laptops, phones, and physical activity under the guise of ‘productivity tracking.’

Browser history, app usage, mouse movements, keystrokes, break clock-outs, Slack messages — there are very few things employers can’t track.

Such intrusive surveillance raises many questions. Is it warranted? Yes, if you ask (micro)managers who doubt their people are working. But otherwise? No, because most employee monitoring software has zero positive effect on performance.

Is it morally questionable? Absolutely. 83% of employers realize the ethical issues with employee surveillance, but 78% nonetheless use monitoring tools due to fear their people aren’t doing enough.

85% of leaders say the shift to hybrid work has made it challenging to trust employee productivity. This has led to productivity paranoia, where leaders fear lost productivity is due to employees not working despite increased hours worked, meetings, and activity metrics.

Microsoft

No one likes being watched — and people get tense. High stress levels and poor mental health naturally lead to lower performance, absenteeism, and disengagement, all of which increase the intention to quit. 63% of workers consider monitoring technology usage a good reason to leave an employer.

When quitting isn’t an option, people often resort to a “productivity theater” strategy — finding workarounds to dupe the apps and inflate the tracked metrics. A quick online search provides plenty of options.

But this only creates more antagonism. Some employers, like Wells Fargo, have responded by firing people who used desktop activity simulation tools. Others are forcing people back to the offices. 

But neither addresses the real problem: Is employee monitoring software the solution to more productive work?

Many employers appear to think so. Starbucks, Delta, Nestlé, and AstraZeneca are using an AI-powered tool to monitor employees’ messages (yes, private ones on social media, too) from company-owned devices.

Barclays installed workplace surveillance software that emailed staff daily to warn them about not being “active enough” or “having too many unaccounted activities” like bathroom breaks. Other options are available to snoop on office and remote workers.

The most common types of employee surveillance

Employee monitoring software has become a $587.8 million market in less than five years, growing at 12% year-on-year.

Still, we feel it’s important to clarify that not all time tracking or attendance management apps are inherently bad. However, some of the following new technologies take employee monitoring too far. 

​​Keystroke logging 

Employee monitoring tools with keylogging features capture keyboard usage frequency and timing as a proxy of engagement. Many also collect specific user inputs like recent search queries, form submissions, file usage, browser activity, and system commands.

Some employers argue it can detect insider threats and breaches of workplace policies. Forcepoint software scans for specific keywords in employee activity to predict whether an employee shows “signs of willingness to leak company information,” “engage in insider trading,” or “show other signs of illicit workplace behavior.”

This degree of monitoring borders on predictive policing, a morally questionable and ineffective practice. 

Screen recordings

Occasional screenshot capture or desktop activity video recording is another feature in some employee monitoring software. Some managers see it as ‘proof’ of employees’ engagement or a justification for tracked billable hours. 

Can employee outputs be measured in screenshots? If your sales manager spends most of their day chatting with clients on Zoom, should you penalize them for that? Or if they spent the day perfecting a few presentation slides that led to a multi-million dollar deal closure?

Screen recordings often contain sensitive corporate and personal data, including logins, passwords, and financial records. If a monitoring app gets breached (which does happen), all of this information will end up in the wrong hands. 

Webcam monitoring 

Requiring employees to always keep their webcams and microphones on is another problematic post-pandemic practice. 37% of employers expect workers to be on camera all day. Among them, 93% monitor real-time video feeds for four or more hours daily — not the best use of supervisors’ time.

Video surveillance is often justified by the following: In the office, employees are monitored with security cameras or by the manager’s keen eye. So equivalent measures must be in place for home-based workers. But regulators don’t agree.

A Dutch court recently fined a US company for unlawfully terminating an employee who refused to keep the webcam on during a 9-hour online training session. His behavior was deemed “insubordination” and “refusal to work,” leading to dismissal. The court ruled that such surveillance invaded privacy under Article 8 of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR) and ordered compensation.

GPS tracking 

Location tracking is common in attendance and shift scheduling apps. It’s not bad as long as the feature is activated with employer consent for legitimate purposes, like optimizing delivery routes or coordinating field service work.

But location tracking can also promote unhealthy management habits, such as immediately questioning employees’ whereabouts when they take a different route or a “suspiciously long” break. It can also invade employee privacy. Walmart was found to collect phone cameras and location data from employees’ personal devices after they forgot to turn off the workplace app after work.

GPS data and attendance monitoring technologies like badges or biometrics are used to build ‘point-based’ systems for tracking absences and lateness. One too many strikes (five in the case of Walmart and eight with Amazon), and you’re out of a job.

These automated systems, however, are error-prone and do not distinguish between absences protected by national labor laws and those violating company policies. Over 18 million workers across 66 US employers were wrongfully impacted by such systems.

Psycholinguistic analysis

Thanks to artificial intelligence (AI) advances, software has improved in evaluating natural language. Beyond detecting specific keywords in emails or phone calls, advanced algorithms can evaluate sentiment, do personality profiling, or seek out signals of “malicious, inappropriate, or illegal behaviors in corporate communication,” as some vendors advertise.

Some businesses might track customer service communications to judge if workers handle complaints well. Others….to moderate internal communication channels for harassment, profanities, or bullying.

But language analysis algorithms aren’t perfect. They can show biases and poorly interpret phrases out of wider context, helping immature managers draw fast (and wrongful) conclusions. Such tools can also breach employees’ legally protected rights.

Collective organizing (unionization) and whistleblowing are protected by American federal, EU, and state laws. Yet, this doesn’t prevent employers from overstepping boundaries. Amazon HR managers, using an email monitoring program, surveyed minority and activism groups to detect employee organizing around controversial issues.

Surveillance vs. non-surveillance-based tools

There’s a big difference between tracking how people spend their time and tracking people themselves. Here’s how a trust-based approach like Toggl Track compares to surveillance-style monitoring tools:

Surveillance Tools	Non-surveillance-based Tools
Focus on control.	Focus on outcomes.
Measure activity (mouse movement, screenshots, GPS tracking).	Measure results (projects, profitability, trends).
Often leads to stress, privacy concerns, and disengagement.	Encourager accountability, trust, and meaningful improvement.
Collect large amounts of surface-level data.	Deliver high-quality insights.

Is worker surveillance even necessary (or legal) in the first place?

Employee surveillance technologies have two major problems: Trust and privacy. Employers monitor workers due to distrust. But workers also distrust employers who obsessively watch their every step. The very nature of surveillance creates an environment of suspicion, fear, and deviance.

Arizona State University researchers found that excessive monitoring policies reduce employee productivity. Workers are more likely to take unapproved breaks, work slower, or engage in performative activities to inflate tracked metrics.

43% of employees spend 10+ hours a week on productivity theater tasks that make them look better in front of managers or colleagues but aren’t really warranted. 

Visier

Invasive employee monitoring also erodes personal accountability. Because people feel constantly micro-managed, they have a lower sense of personal responsibility, show less initiative, and don’t perform to the best of their abilities. 

In many cases, employee surveillance often backfires. Instead of higher performance and productivity, workers become disengaged and miserable. 3 in 4 workers say workplace monitoring lowers job satisfaction. Employees channel more energy into being visibly busy or thwarting monitoring systems instead of applying the same zeal to meaningful work.

By focusing just on the actions people take, these tools completely ignore the environment in which people are working. Managers are often attempting to juice productivity within fundamentally broken environments—full of fragmented or non-standardized processes and tasks, user-unfriendly IT applications, poor UX design, bottlenecks, and other factors that make work harder and slower. No single employee controls these variables and is instead subjected to them. Therefore, not only do these productivity tools fail to fix what is broken, they don’t even surface the real issues.

Rohan Narayana Murty,  junior fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows and CTO at Soroco

Apart from being morally questionable and mildly effective, workplace monitoring can be illegal.

A number of privacy laws restrict employee data collection: 

• General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) 
• European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR)
• Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) 
• California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) 
• UK Data Protection Act 2018
• Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) 2000

These laws don’t ban employee monitoring per se, but each limits its applicability. Employers must obtain workers’ consent, disclose monitoring use cases, restrict these to specific circumstances, and ensure the measures aren’t excessively intrusive.

Some national laws push for stricter workplace privacy. French CNIL says screen captures “are likely to be neither relevant nor proportionate since it is a frozen image of an isolated action by the employee, which does not faithfully reflect his or her work.”

The authority discourages such employee monitoring with a few exceptions, such as training or combating fraud. Employees cannot be subject to both video and phone call recordings at the same time.

Violators of data privacy rules risk fines. CNIL fined Amazon’s French division €32 million in 2024 for creating an intrusive employee monitoring system and running video surveillance without consent.

Employers can also face consequences for using collected data. An ExpressVPN survey found that 73% of employers used logged employee activity data and electrical communication for performance reviews, 43% to monitor potential workers’ union formations, and 37% as evidence for firing. When companies are then sued for privacy violations, courts often side with workers. 

In the US, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued a warning against adopting monitoring tools using algorithmic scoring, third-party background checks, or any technology lacking transparency or breaching legal privacy protection.

Denmark has amended its video surveillance laws to bar companies from using remote or automatic workplace cameras for anything but security and crime prevention.

Greece and Cyprus have prohibited remote employee monitoring via webcams, while Portugal says employers must inform workers about any devices and apps used to monitor their activity remotely.

We are urging all organizations to consider both their legal obligations and their workers’ rights before any monitoring is implemented. While data protection law does not prevent monitoring, our guidance is clear that it must be necessary, proportionate, and respect the rights of workers. We will take action if we believe people’s privacy is being threatened.

The UK Information Commissioner’s Office 

There are (several) better ways to monitor and manage employee performance

Employee surveillance rarely achieves the desired effect because it optimizes the wrong measures.

Many companies still peg productivity to vague metrics like “visibility,” “total productive hours,” or even absurd ones like “logged keystrokes” or “messages sent” (although to be fair, 39% of C-suite execs polled did say there is too much focus on hours worked rather than output achieved).

The point is that these measures only increase productivity paranoia, where companies try to coerce employees into productive mode via nagging, micro-management, threats, and punishments.

Happiness, not fear, is the strongest productivity driver.

Our brain triggers a fight-or-flight response whenever our stress level rises. There’s a 50% chance we’ll either act and power through the unreasonable demand or freeze and fall further behind on a stressful task. Ongoing stress leads to loss of motivation, emotional exhaustion, and reduced effectiveness.

Happy workers, on the contrary, are 13% more productive. They use their time more effectively to complete tasks faster and at a higher quality. Happiness and high performance directly correlate with intrinsic motivation — our internal drive to engage in interesting, novel, or inherently satisfying activities.

Many employee performance management strategies only leverage extrinsic motivation — financial rewards, praise, or aversion to negative consequences. Employee surveillance tools only aggravate the latter.

A better (but slightly harder) approach is maximizing workers’ intrinsic motivation. This includes giving people greater autonomy and control over their actions (instead of micromanaging), helping them gain necessary competence levels, and giving them appropriately challenging tasks.

Timely feedback, supporting workplace dynamics, and a stronger connection to the company’s purpose improve employee performance more than blanket monitoring and threats.

Not sure where to start? Try these softer approaches to employee performance management.

Collaborative goal-setting

Humans are wonderfully unique, and everyone has their own timelines for getting good work done. The timing correlates with the nature of the job, their skill set, and cognitive capabilities.

As managers, we can help people understand and meet expectations by setting SMART team goals. Explain their importance and each person’s contribution to them, then break down each goal into individual KPIs — metrics that reflect real progress rather than sham activity.  

At the end of the day, you want your people to deliver better business results, not type more messages or stare into the webcam for 8 hours straight.

Data-driven capacity planning 

Good managers optimize employee outputs, not contributions. Just because someone is “active” for 8 hours doesn’t mean they contribute more value than someone doing 4 or 6 deep work hours. They may be less productive in “real terms” — waste time in unnecessary meetings, on redundant tasks, or by troubleshooting broken workflows. 

In such cases, time tracking, not activity tracking, can identify what’s holding your people back and where inefficiencies cost money. Analyzing time spent on tasks can reveal ways to remove, optimize, or automate low-value work. 

Focus on deep work 

Longer hours don’t translate to more outputs. Our brain has performance limits — it can muster five hours max of hard cognitive workload. 

Carving out that space is hard due to constant interruptions from messages, meetings, and other seemingly urgent but non-essential requests. For example, software engineers spend only 32% of their time writing code and about 70% on testing, operational, and management tasks.

An anonymous survey among FAANG employees also found 45% of workers don’t do more than four hours of focused work daily. Yet, these companies are hardly unprofitable. In fact, many companies and even entire countries are switching to six-hour workdays or four-day workweeks, and their productivity and economic outputs increase.

To improve your people’s productivity, you need to maximize the opportunities for deep work in a blissful state of distraction-free concentration. To promote deep work, companies adopt asynchronous communication, remove daily, recurrent meetings, and encourage employees to time block entries on their calendars for deep work. 

1:1 feedback sessions 

Immature managers often use employee monitoring software data to issue warnings to underperforming employees without investigating root causes. In 99% of cases, there’s a good reason for a performance dip.

Anika might have had a hard week due to a family issue but didn’t take PTO because it would look bad in the attendance tracker. Or Latricia might have been given a new task with unclear instructions, spending hours on call and in Slack clarifying the requirements. A manager must understand where and why their team is struggling — that’s what 1:1 sessions are for.

Toggle Track vs. competitors with surveillance features

Below is a comparison of Toggl Track and other employee monitoring tools, highlighting the types of insights each approach provides.

Tool	Surveillance features	Types of actionable data / reports
Toggl Track	❌ None. The Timeline feature (records which apps/websites are open) is fully optional, stored locally, and never visible to other workspace members.	Project profitability, billable vs. non-billable hours, team capacity, workload distribution, and time-use trends.
Time Doctor	✅ Screenshots, app and URL tracking, keyboard and mouse activity levels, idle-time detection, and “unusual activity” alerts.	Productivity scores, performance summaries for teams and individuals, attendance and timeline reports, app and website usage breakdowns, project and task analytics, and alerts for unusual activity patterns.
Hubstaff	✅ Screenshots, GPS tracking, app and URL monitoring, idle-time alerts, and optional webcam capture.	Location and job-site reports, detailed activity metrics, proof-of-work screenshots, timesheets, productivity leaderboards, and device-activity insights.
Clockify	✅ Optional screenshots, GPS / location tracking (mobile), automatic app and website usage tracking, and idle detection.	Activity dashboards with time and cost summaries, field location data, and screenshot-based validation for project work.
Everhour	✅ Optional screenshots (via desktop app).	Time-stamped screenshots for task verification, plus budget tracking, profit and expense reporting, and invoiced time via the Report Hub.

While tools built around surveillance generate a lot of activity data but little clarity, Toggl focuses on meaningful insights, turning time data into progress, not pressure.

Toggl’s anti-surveillance stance

At Toggl, we’re big proponents of time tracking for personal productivity, not behavior policing. 

Our products will never have features that could breach employee privacy. No keystroke logging, screen captures, or location tracking — because we believe in empowering people, not oppressing them with totalitarian-like surveillance.  

Toggl Track’s mission is to provide the big picture of productivity data through the pane of time management. Studying your habits, processes, and task completion rates can help you understand when your performance is peak and what holds your company down. 

Time tracking gives real project visibility: Progress across sub-tasks, budget usage, resource availability, and time blockers. Activity monitoring only gives you “noise” — no context into group progress or individual contributions beyond the number of sites visited. In the end, it is the outcomes that matter, not the inputs. 

As long as everybody has a clear understanding what needs to be done, you can be quite liberal on how exactly the work is done.

Alari Aho, Toggl Founder

By giving our people the opportunity to be flexible with their time — all Togglers are free to choose when and how much they work — we’ve built a strong, loyal, distributed workforce of 150 people. When many choose to double down on surveillance, we put our bets on trust.  

How to fight “productivity paranoia”

The definition of paranoia is “unjustified suspicion and mistrust of others,” and that’s exactly what we’ve seen for the last couple of years.

Managers doubt their people are working enough and obsess over marginal metrics. Greedy software vendors fuel that frenzy with Black Mirror-esque technologies, such as work pods with heart-rate sensors to detect employee stress levels or AI-powered facial recognition apps to detect emotional cues and predict workers’ behaviors.

Such systems further erode workplace trust, leading to higher turnover, low morale, strained leader-staff dynamics, reduced innovation potential, and poor company performance, according to research. 

What we chose to do at Toggl (and now encourage others to do) is focus on restoring trust and increasing individual accountability. Here’s how.

Aim for workload visibility  

Suspicions often grow in the shadows. Without visibility into the teams’ workloads, capacity, and processes, it’s easy to doubt your people’s productivity and business profitability.

Workers, in turn, lack clarity in their priorities, don’t understand task dependencies, and focus on perfunctory work like attending meetings or quickly responding to emails.

Get your project management in order. Are your task estimates accurate? Do the deadlines make sense for the proposed chunk of work? Do you have to break down and parallelize tasks across two people instead of piling everything on one person?

A project management app with time-tracking features can determine each person’s scope of work, plan tasks, and track progress.

Greater workload transparency helps employers set clear expectations, and workers maintain clarity in their priorities. It also shifts the dynamics from proving, “Look, I’m working,” in favor of demonstrating your progress towards established goals and results. This creates greater personal accountability and removes expectation ambiguities.

Build a feedback-focused culture 

Workplace tensions arise when people can’t find common ground. Employees don’t understand what’s expected of them, and managers struggle to frame their demands or explain how to do better. This aggravates the disconnect between workers and leaders and undermines trust.

The solution is implementing more frequent and objective feedback cycles. Netflix encourages the open (sometimes uncomfortable, yet necessary) practice of sharing constructive feedback with everyone, including subordinates, peers, managers, or senior executives. All feedback follows the 4A Principle: 

When giving feedback:

• Aim to assist
• Actionable

When receiving feedback:

• Appreciate
• Accept or discard

Work in targeted sprints 

Endless grind isn’t the answer to better productivity. With constant stress to deliver faster and better, most people will burn out and quit, leaving you with fewer hands on deck and slimmer chances to deliver on the big objective.

A better option is keeping your team “toned” with a mix of high and low-intensity cycles as 37signals (Basecamp) does. Every team operates on a 6-week cycle, followed by a 2-week cooldown. This model creates a sense of urgency to keep the progress happening but also gives enough room for reflection, quick fixes, and rest. Work hours are strictly limited to 40h/week (32 hours in the summer) — forcing teams to ruthlessly prioritize what matters and enjoy life outside of work for better personal well-being. 

The company has no official growth or revenue targets, yet it’s been profitable for 24 years with over 100,000 customers.

The future of remote work productivity

For some companies, remote work was one of the greater workplace experiments — an opportunity to re-evaluate and reinvent operating processes and even their business models. For others, it’s become an ongoing source of tension, leading to the rise in employee monitoring software adoption and forced return-to-office (RTO) mandates. 

However, one in seven leaders at Fortune 500 companies that require in-person work say this rule had no impact on staff productivity.

The truth is many remote-first companies like 37signals, Buffer, Toggl, and Automattic, have always been efficient and productive. Not because we allow people to work from home and take more breaks, or use some form of monitoring. But because we choose to build a strong culture of strong personal accountability, high trust, and open communication. 

To succeed, leaders need to change how teams work, not where. This requires greater clarity into workload distribution, process efficiency, and time for deep work — something we aim to provide with our technology. 

Toggl Track brings time data into all major workflows, providing clarity into capacities, workloads, performance, and goals. Simple interface, powerful insights, and huge no to any form of surveillance get a 100% team buy-in for adoption.