Toggl Track works so effortlessly primarily because it doesn't ask much of you when you start timing a task. The time tracking tool has a generous free tier of service that gives you access to all its apps (Android, iOS, Windows, macOS, Linux, Web, and browser extensions) and includes all the core functionality you'd expect in a time tracking app. In fact, until I found my new favorite timer while researching for this article, Toggl has been a daily part of my freelance workflow.

If you need a time tracker tool but can't pay for one, you should use Toggl Track. While time-tracking clocks can be very helpful inside these tools, I assume if that's what you need, you're likely shopping for a more robust solution. If you're looking for more team-focused apps, take a look at Zapier's picks for the best free timesheet software.Īdditionally, I haven't included project management, invoicing, or accounting apps that come with an add-on or built-in time tracker. With these tools, you choose how much (if any) data to share with your supervisors.

I did include two automated tracking tools that monitor users' activities-but the data is for each user's eyes only. I didn't consider employee monitoring software, which often includes some type of time tracking. Here, I focused specifically on finding a time tracker for freelancers, individuals, and small teams. I gave special consideration to time trackers that use AI to auto-track your time or use machine learning to automatically assign time blocks to related tasks and projects. Artificial intelligence is automating and simplifying workflows across tools of all industries, and time tracking apps are no exception. They have the versatility to let you start a timer from wherever is most convenient to you, whether that's your browser, a desktop app, or your mobile device.īonus: AI features. The best time tracking tools make starting a timer easy and convenient. All these apps let you either automatically create invoices from the time tracking data stored in the app or export that information into PDFs, CSVs, or Google Sheets to share with the right people. Once you aggregate all your time spent on your work, you have to be able to take action on it. The ability to create an invoice or export data. The most powerful time tracking apps offer dashboards and reports that let you break out daily, weekly, or monthly time spent per project, per person, or per client. For example, if your phone rings and you jump into a 20-minute consulting call, you might not start a timer, but you do want to log and bill for those hours worked. You also want an app that lets you enter a block of time post hoc in case you forget to launch a timer at all. You should be able to edit the time log to subtract however many minutes you weren't working. The best apps let you correct time tracked after the fact, such as if you accidentally leave a timer running while you take off for lunch. The ability to edit time tracked or manually add time blocks. Nearly all time tracking apps let you track in real time, meaning they give you a running clock that you launch when you start a task, and that you can pause or stop when you finish. When evaluating the best time tracking apps, I considered the following criteria: If you're part of a team, time tracking can help you answer the question, 'What have you been working on this month?' What do you do with this information? Perhaps most importantly, project time tracking can help you get paid, allowing you to feel confident about your invoices rather than trying to estimate how much time you worked after the fact. Whether you're working solo or in a small team, time tracking software can give you a complete overview of your daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly work. When you know how you spend your time, you can analyze your work trends and make smarter business decisions. For more details on our process, read the full rundown of how we select apps to feature on the Zapier blog. We're never paid for placement in our articles from any app or for links to any site-we value the trust readers put in us to offer authentic evaluations of the categories and apps we review. Unless explicitly stated, we spend dozens of hours researching and testing apps, using each app as it's intended to be used and evaluating it against the criteria we set for the category. Our best apps roundups are written by humans who've spent much of their careers using, testing, and writing about software.

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