12 Best Employee Time Tracking Apps Tested Hands-On
As your business grows, you need to keep an eye on what your employees are up to in their work hours. Are they clocking in on time, using the appropriate business apps, working on the right documents, and taking well-timed breaks? Without employee time-tracking software, it’s impossible to guarantee this.
Employee time-tracking technology looks after the lifeblood of your organization – your workforce. It’s so much more than only a work ‘timer’ that prevents employees from getting lazy or late. It shines a window into employee performance and encourages them to be more responsible and accountable with their time.
This article will help you choose the best employee time-tracking solution for your business. We explain how these applications work and the 12 leading options in the employee time-tracking software category in 2024.
What is an Employee Time Tracking Software?
Employee time-tracking tools come in different shapes and sizes. Some are built into accounting software like Bonsai and FreshBooks, so you know exactly how much time your team spent on a project, and you can bill your client accordingly.
Customer relationship management (CRM) software also includes time-tracking capabilities. It helps map the amount of time and effort spent on each customer. To do this, CRM software usually comes with employee time tracking integrations and add-ons.
Another approach to employee time tracking is to use a powerful mobile spy app. Spy apps are perfectly legal to install on company-owned devices and provide insight into which apps employees are using, when, and for how long. They also let you monitor keystrokes.
Endpoint security systems can also double as employee time-tracking software. They analyze device activity to reveal all kinds of data, including the employee’s productivity patterns, app usage habits, and idle time. They’re also useful for detecting security risks and insider threats.
With so many types of employee time-tracking tools available, it can be difficult to find the best one. In this guide, we’ve narrowed down the 12 best platforms across categories. Based on our hands-on experience, we’ve looked at each app’s pros, cons, and use cases.
What is the Best Employee Time Tracking Software You Can Use?
Before we delve into our in-depth reviews, here’s a quick look at the best time-tracking apps. Keep in mind that their suitability will depend on the exact needs of your business and the number of workers you employ.
- mSpy – The best time-tracking software for mobile monitoring and keylogging
- Spynger – Top employee spy app with a useful remote screenshot feature
- uMobix – Top employee tracking tool that covers over 30 apps
- EyeZy – Time management app to control and restrict app access
- Salesforce – World’s best CRM with flexible employee time-tracking integrations
- Pipedrive – Sales pipeline management tool with employee time tracking
- Zoho CRM – Small business operations suite with time management apps and other tools
- Teramind – Best for time-tracking and productivity analytics dashboards
- ActivTrak – Best employee web activity tracker and time management app
- Hubstaff – Best employee time-tracking software with geofencing and integrations
- Flowace – Best time and productivity tracking solution for distributed teams
- Spyic – The ideal employee time-tracking app for small teams
We Tested the 12 Leading Employee Time Tracking Apps: Our Detailed Findings
Your choice of employee time-tracking software is an important decision. You’ll rely on this tool to understand how well your team is working and, accordingly, decide how to manage your employees. The success of your business, in many ways, will hinge on this tool.
Therefore, here’s an in-depth look at how each of these solutions works and what makes them a good fit for your business.
1. mSpy: The Best Employee Monitoring Software for Mobile Devices
mSpy simplifies employee time tracking and offers a comprehensive solution for employee activity and location tracking. It is also one of the best keyloggers for iOS and Android.
Pricing | Compatibility | Free Plan/Trial | Refund |
$16.67/Month — 1-Year Plan | All Android 4+ Devices
iOS 11 – 14.8.1 — With Jailbreak All iOS Versions — Without Jailbreak |
Demo | 14-Day Money-Back Guarantee |
mSpy is a champion of tracking communication channels. You’ll be alerted with every new message and reply, whether it’s the target’s Whatsapp, Snapchat, or Facebook Messenger; mSpy’s eyes are everywhere.
It has a phenomenal keystroke logger that will tell you every keystroke that was entered, on what app (browser search bars included), and when.
You can manage your field workers with mSpy’s live GPS tracking or location history to ensure they’re not up to anything spooky.
In addition to providing live video recordings, mSpy’s screen recorder lets you download every conversation’s screenshot—in case you need to build up evidence against an employee’s unethical practices.
With a graph of the target phone’s overall device activity, including a list of the contacts and websites they recently visited, mSpy leaves no stone unturned in securing your business’s data and productivity.
Pricing
- Monthly: $69.99/month
- Quarterly: $40/month
- Yearly: $16.67/month
mSpy’s yearly plan at $16.67/month is a bargain. Plus, it often comes up with additional discounts, so keep an eye out for those.
How can we not mention the 14-day money-back guarantee? Try mSpy now, and if you don’t like it, you can get a full refund.
Pros
- An easy 3-step installation process
- Ideal for small businesses
- Easy user interface with customizability
- Precise geofencing and GPS Tracking
- Allows remote screenshots and recordings via phone
Cons
- Not available over desktop
- Supports only one device per plan
2. Spynger – Top Employee Spy App with Remote Screenshot Feature
Spynger might be better known for its spying capabilities (it’s in the name) than it is for being used as employee monitoring software, but it’s actually very adept at both. Part of the reason for this is that it features advanced tools like a remote screenshot option, which allows you to see what the target user’s device is doing.
This is a great way for employers to monitor work computers and other mobile devices, and you don’t need to worry about rooting or jailbreaking them either. Simply access the main dashboard, find the device you’re monitoring, and hit capture to see what’s going on.
Pricing
Compatibility
Free Plan/Trial
Refund
$10.83/month
Web, MacOS, Windows, Android, iOS, Linux
No
14-days
Better still, this feature, and all the others that come bundled in with Spynger, act under total anonymity. This is thanks to a nifty setting called ‘Stealth Mode’, which allows the app to run undetected in the background, meaning your employees won’t know it’s there.
There are a host of other useful features, mainly focused on viewing locations and communication from the target device. For example, SPynger is equipped with market-leading GPS tracking, a great tool for checking where your workers are to ensure they aren’t wasting valuable company time.
You’ll also have access to all social media messages, SMS, and call logs. This feature will come in handy for employers who suspect that company devices are being used for inappropriate activities, such as personal calls, browsing TikTok, and much more.
Plus, for those of you who aren’t well-versed in using advanced employee tracking software, you needn’t worry with Spynger. The app is incredibly user-friendly and neatly displays all of the key details on the main dashboard.
Overall, despite not being a dedicated employee monitoring service, Spynger offers enough features to rise to the top of our list. With it, you’ll be able to keep an eye on all employee communications, as well as knwoign exactly where they are at all times.
Pricing
- Monthly – $45.49/month
- Quarterly – $26/month
- Annual – $10.83/month
For just $10.83/month, Spynger offers an attractive range of features with a budget-friendly price tag. Despite not having quite as many advanced features as mSpy, it has more than enough to monitor all of your employees.
Pros
Cons
3. uMobix: A Fantastic Employee Tracker Covering Over 30 Apps
uMobix is not only one of the best phone spy apps but also excels as an employee time tracking app, too, thanks to its phenomenal device tracking and time monitoring features. For starters, it can monitor over 30 mobile apps completely undetected, including Telegram, Chrome, Whatsapp, and Instagram.
Pricing | Compatibility | Free Plan/Trial | Refund |
$11.66/month – 12-month plan | Android, iOS, Tablets | Live Demo | 14-Day Money-Back Guarantee |
uMobix also gives you data regarding your employees’ media files, GPS locations, internet searches (even in incognito mode), and all copy-pasted/typed/deleted texts, including the time spent on these activities, so you’ll know how productive a particular user or department is.
With access to your team’s messages and call logs, you’ll be able to ensure they are communicating well with the clients and are sparing enough time for them.
In addition to all this, you can access your employees’ deleted data and control their devices remotely — you can restrict access to specific websites and apps — so that they do not overstep your business’s internal code of conduct.
Besides being a feature-rich employee tracker, uMobix is also incredibly accommodating. It’s available in multiple international languages and tags, along with a free demo, making it easier for you to get acquainted with its interface.
Pricing
- 1-month: $49.99/month
- 3-month: $27.99/month
- 12-month: $11.66/month
At just $11.66/month, uMobix’s 1-year plan is a great value-for-money deal.
Try it risk-free with a live demo and a 14-day money-back guarantee.
Pros
- Real-time notifications for all activities
- Ideal for tracking mobile devices
- Provides control over more than 7 social media apps
- Access to deleted employee data
- Excellent customer support
- Available in multiple languages
Cons
- High battery consumption
- Each subscription is limited to a single device
4. EyeZy: A Top Employee Monitoring Tool For Latest Video Recording Features
EyeZy is not very different from mSpy. Both are excellent parental control apps that also double as fantastic employee time and activity trackers.
Pricing | Compatibility | Free Plan/Trial | Refund |
$9.99/Month — 1-Year Plan | Android, iOS, Tablets | Free Demo, 3-Day Free Trial | 14-Day Money-Back Guarantee |
EyeZy’s keylogger requires jailbreaking or rooting the target device, but it does a solid job of recording every detail about every keystroke, including what app, search bar, or chat it was typed in.
In addition to knowing what your employees are searching for online, you’ll also have access to their call log — in fact, Eyezy is one of the best call logger apps out there.
Yes, you can use EyeZy to remotely restrict your employees’ access to specific websites and apps, but you can do one better to be a little more accommodating — set a specific time limit on usage of unproductive apps during work hours. Once the set time limit is crossed, your employees won’t be able to access those apps altogether.
Speaking of EyeZy’s screen recording feature, it’s always the first in the industry to implement new technology, leaving little to no room for your employees to hide malicious intent.
EyeZy takes a screenshot any time your target phone receives a new message or sends one, but you’re free to customize alerts for any specific set of keywords.
Pricing
- Monthly: $47.99/month
- Quarterly: $27.99/month
- Yearly: $9.99/month
At $9.99/month, EyeZy offers the best value-for-money proposition as compared to other secret screen recorders. Plus, with a free demo, a 3-day free trial, and a 14-day money-back guarantee on your side, you can have a good taste of whether EyeZy is the one for you before you put any money in it.
Pros
- Excellent call-logging feature
- Top-notch geofencing and GPS tracking
- Allows setting time limits on unproductive apps
- Constant customer support
- Ideal for remote employee monitoring
Cons
- Slow data syncing on iOS
- Some features need jailbreaking
5. Salesforce – World’s Best CRM with Flexible Employee Time-Tracking Integrations
When it comes to CRM statistics and trends, Salesforce has always been a leading name. Founded in 1999, the cloud software provider is now the world’s 61st-largest company. Salesforce offers a wide range of marketing, sales, and productivity solutions to businesses of all sizes.
Salesforce offers two products for small businesses – the Starter Suite and the Pro Suite. Both include tools for marketing, sales, customer support, and omnichannel commerce, with the Pro version introducing greater customization and automation.
Pricing
Compatibility
Free Plan/Trial
Refund
$25/month/user onwards
Android, Windows, iPhone, iPad, and browsers
30-day free trial
NA
Coming to employee time-tracking, Salesforce gives you plenty of options. In fact, the product’s app store is why Salesforce made it onto our list of the best employee time-tracking software. You can download a time-tracking tool that fits your requirements from Salesforce AppExchange, its app gallery.
Using Salesforce, you can track time spent on the app, on each customer or project, or even on a single complaint or service call. You can even track the time it takes to complete one process and move on to the next.
Pricing
Salesforce offers various offerings to fit different budgets—the Starter Suite costs $25/month/user, and the Pro Suite is priced at $100/month/user.
You also get a free 30-day trial for all plans. However, some (not all) of the employee time-tracking integrations are paid, costing between $5 and $20/month/user.
Pros
- Powerful and comprehensive business tool
- Comes with Einstein AI
- Multiple options for businesses of every size
- Flexible and customized time tracking
Cons
- Complex software with a learning curve
- Can be expensive as you grow
6. Pipedrive – Sales Pipeline Management Tool with Employee Time Tracking
Pipedrive, while not as powerful as Salesforce, is also an incredibly useful CRM tool and a great way to track the time spent by your sales team. It’s a highly visual platform, with tasks, process flows, and workloads represented through graphics. This makes Pipedrive an easy-to-understand, engaging tool.
At its core, Pipedrive is a sales enablement solution. This means it has everything you need to convert a lead and grow your sales. You can schedule tasks on your sales pipeline, see where leads might be dropping off, which activities are leading to the highest conversion rates, and learn who’s your ideal customer.
Pricing
Compatibility
Free Plan/Trial
Refund
$12/month/user onwards
Android, Windows, iPhone, iPad, and browsers
14-day free trial
NA
You can also use Pipedrive for a host of other key tasks like sending customer emails, creating invoices, and chatting with your customers – and you can track employee time spent on each activity. Pipedrive also has an extensive app marketplace where you can download the Timely time-tracking integration.
The integration activates a ‘memory tracker’ as soon as you start using Pipedrive. All the time employees spend using the CRM platform will automatically appear on the logs. Using this technology, employees can auto-populate their timesheets and monitor how quickly they can close a deal.
Pricing
Pipedrive users can choose one of these five plans:
- Essential: $12/month/user
- Advanced: $24/month/user
- Professional: $49/month/user
- Power: $59/month/user
- Enterprise: $79/month/user
The company offers full pricing transparency, which is good news for businesses budgeting for employee time tracking and other tools. Time-tracking features are included with every plan. If you opt for the Professional, Power, or Enterprise version of Pipedrive, you can also access advanced capabilities like artificial intelligence (AI).
Pros
Cons
7. Zoho CRM – Small Business Operations Suite with Time Management Apps and Other Tools
Another powerful CRM software, Zoho, is also a great option for businesses looking to track employee time – especially when they’re busy with customer-facing tasks. All you have to do is install the ‘Time Tracker for Zoho CRM’ extension from the company’s app store.
This extension allows employees to start a timer every time they work on a customer contact from Zoho CRM. The software will record what exactly the employee is doing (e.g., working on documentation) and note the hourly billing rate.
Pricing
Compatibility
Free Plan/Trial
Refund
$20/month/user onwards
Android, Windows, iPhone, iPad, and browsers
Free plan; 15-day free trial
NA
Additionally, Zoho offers dedicated tools for employee time tracking. The company builds operations software for small—to mid-sized businesses and provides a variety of software apps, such as CRM, HR systems, accounting, and project management. You can use these apps separately or together.
Let’s say you’re using Zoho CRM. You could also opt for the company’s time tracking and scheduling app called Zoho Shifts. And, if you install Zoho People, you can generate timesheets based on the time-tracking data you collect. With Zoho, you could scale your time-tracking system up or down as required for your business.
Pricing
Zoho CRM is quite affordable, starting at $20/month/user. If there’s an ongoing promo or discount, you could get it for as little as $10/month/user. There’s a free-forever plan that supports up to three users, partial automation and 10 email templates.
Apart from the entry-level plan, prices go up to $35/month/user, $50/month/user, and $65/month/user. These plans include several advanced features, such as inventory management, customizations, and business intelligence.
Pros
Cons
8. Teramind – The Best Overall Employee Tracking Software in 2024
Teramind tops our list, and for good reason. There are fewer tools that can combine monitoring, analytics, and reporting features the way Teramind does. It goes beyond basic employee monitoring features and provides detailed activity updates and insights on your employees’ performance and productivity.
Pricing | Compatibility | Free Plan/Trial | Refund |
$10/user/month | Windows, Mac | Live Demo, Free Plan, 14-Day Free Trial | 30-Day Money-Back Guarantee |
You’ll have a database of all your employees, with their respective departments written alongside their names, so you’ll know if any department as a whole is slacking. The Teramind dashboard will give you detailed insights into your employees’ day, including their current task in hand, active and idle time, and code of conduct violations, if any.
With Teramind’s alerting feature, you can send automated notifications to your employees if they spend more than a certain amount of time on an unproductive app, which, of course, you’ll have the option to specify beforehand. Other remedies include blocking the app, logging the employee out, and more. Need we say more?
We do. Teramind’s video capturing is highly versatile — you can capture:
- Normal screen recordings
- Live broadcast of employee PCs
- Zoom sessions
To top it off, Teramind backs up its beyond-impressive catalog of features with a seamless user experience. Starting from a live demo — get a glimpse of the tool in action — to live chat for any queries that you might have, enjoy every step of the journey is hurdle-free with Teramind.
Pricing
Teramind starts at an extremely affordable $10/month/user for the Starter plan, which includes limited time utilization rules. The user activity monitoring (UAM) plan costs $21/month/user, and the data loss prevention (DLP) plan is priced at $25/month/user.
There’s a custom-priced Enterprise plan that comes with premium support and enhanced security. It’s also suitable for public sector organizations since it’s compatible with AWS GovCloud and Azure Government.
Pros
- Impressive user interface and dashboard
- Automated notification feature
- Excellent customer support
- Wide range of video-capturing options
- Comes with a policy manager
- Enabled with visual rule editor
Cons
- Expensive for small businesses
- In-depth features can be complicated
9. ActivTrak: The Best Free Employee Time Tracking Software For Improving Employee Productivity
ActivTrak is the best free employee time tracking app. What sets it apart is its equal focus on both employee tracking and improving worker productivity. With one of the easiest-to-understand UIs in the industry, ActivTrak chalks up a productivity bar chart that shows productive, unproductive, and idle time separately. You can also filter the results to show a specific department or user.
Pricing | Compatibility | Free Plan/Trial | Refund |
$10/user/month – Annual Plan | Windows, Mac, ChromeOS | Free Plan, 14-Day Trial Plan | No |
ActivTack doesn’t have targeted views like Teramind, but it does an impeccable job of showing what websites and apps your employees are currently on. Click on the Camera icon to take a screenshot if you want to zoom in.
ActivTrak puts time tracking on autopilot; it’ll send out real-time threat alerts and non-compliance reminders to employees. What’s more, ActivTrak is also customizable — you can decide the time interval after which you want ActicTrak to take a screenshot of the employee device.
The best part? You can view old screenshots by filtering them under categories such as user, date, and productivity. And not only can you mark websites and apps as productive/unproductive, but you can also segregate them further into categories like banking, games, email, entertainment, and more.
ActicTrak’s bottom line is not to pry on employees but to produce analytics and insights that give you a better idea of how you can improve their productivity. For example, based on employee searches, you can zero in on the areas they’re incompetent at and design a coaching/training module accordingly.
Pricing
ActivTrak starts free and offers a compelling free package with features such as activity alarms and 24/7 access to educational resources. If you need a little more from the tool, go for the Advanced plan ($10/user/month) that comes with features such as remote installation and alarm-triggered screenshots.
For mid-sized to large organizations with slightly more complex employee time tracking needs, you can choose the Professional plan for $19/month/user or the custom-priced Enterprise plan. With every plan, you can integrate paid add-ons like screenshots, headcount planning, and business intelligence templates.
Note that ActivTrak’s 14-day trial plan is equivalent to its Premium plan.
Pros
- Offers a free plan
- Schedule tasks based on peak productivity
- Interactive dashboard and graphical presentations
- Easy setup and user-friendly
- Enabled with the screenshot feature
Cons
- Doesn’t offer screen recordings
- No monthly subscriptions
10. HubStaff: The Best Software For Tracking Employees Based on Their Location
HubStaff is one of the biggest employee tracking apps. Every month, it helps over 40,000 businesses worldwide with their combined 4 million tasks and 21 million hours of tracking.
Pricing | Compatibility | Free Plan/Trial | Refund |
$5.83/user/month – Monthly Plan | Windows, Mac, Android, iOS, Web | Free Plan, Demo, 14-Day Trial Plan | 60-Day Money-Back Guarantee |
HubStaff’s USP is the geofenced time-tracking feature on its mobile app. Here, the concerned employee is clocked in and out automatically based on their location, so you don’t have to worry about your team rigging the timesheet for onsite jobs.
Other time tracking features include online timesheets, time reports, and timesheet approval to get accurate numbers on hour-based wages and to ensure you pay for only legitimate hours. Such built-in integrations will save you money that you’d have otherwise spent on third-party payroll and invoicing integrations.
You can also track what websites and apps your employee visits, how long their sessions are, see the activity provided by their mouse and keyboards (HubStaff doesn’t log keys per se), and capture screenshots remotely. You can then access all this info from HubStaff’s dashboard, where you can filter the results by user.
Another standout HubStaff feature is how it integrates with leading project management tools like Asana and Trello to give you a better understanding of your employee’s productivity and progress with assigned tasks.
Pricing
HubStaff is the only employee time-tracking app with a 60-day money-back guarantee—ActivTrak doesn’t have one. With a free plan and paid plans starting as low as $5.83/user/month, HubStaff sells itself.
However, to use HubStaff’s most prestigious feature—GPS tracking—you’ll have to pay $10/month/user, which is still at par with the industry’s best.
Pros
- Location-based time tracking feature
- Easy-to-use online timesheets
- Excellent remote employee monitoring
- Simple and intuitive user interface
- Integrates with CRM and PM tools
Cons
- Difficult to see past payroll amounts
- No on-time Chrome alerts
11. Flowace – Best Time and Productivity Tracking Solution for Distributed Teams
Flowace is a powerful productivity-tracking solution that also tracks employee time. The best part is that Flowace is fully automated. You can download the desktop, web, or mobile app, and it’ll work in the background, logging every detail of how employees use their time.
Flowace reveals several useful metrics about employee time. It breaks down the hours spent on each website and app and captures idle or break time with surprising accuracy. You can even see the specific document or file an employee is working on, complete with timestamps.
Pricing
Compatibility
Free Plan/Trial
Refund
$1.99/month/user onwards
iOS, Android, Windows, MacOS, Linux (Ubuntu)
7-day free trial
NA
The software uses artificial intelligence to prevent time theft. Every employee has a unique identifier associated with them, and when they clock in for the day or log time, the AI engine monitors every activity. It can tell who’s there and who isn’t and catch fraud.
You can also use Flowace as a task and project management software. For instance, by importing all your project files to the platform, you can track how much time you spend on solo and collaborative work. Every activity is accompanied by a GPS location tag, making employee time-tracking much easier for distributed teams.
Pricing
Flowace is among the most affordable employee time-tracking software on this list. Here are the three plans available:
- Basic: $1.99/month/user
- Standard: $3.99 /month/user
- Premium: $6.99/month/user
You can enjoy automated time-tracking capabilities in all of these plans.
We’d recommend upgrading to Standard if you want to integrate Flowace with any other app (say, for instance, a resource management platform). The Premium plan includes video recordings of employee desktops and internet connectivity reports.
Pros
- Real-time inactivity alerts
- Projects, tasks, and productivity metrics
- Dedicated account manager for support
- Works with Linux systems
Cons
- Limited set of integrations
- No free plan
12. Spyic: The Employee Time Tracking Software With The Longest Money-Back Guarantee of 60 Days
Spyic might not be the most feature-rich service for employee monitoring, but it’ll still do a decent enough job for small businesses with a small team (3-5 members) that do not require extensive tracking across multiple fronts.
Pricing | Compatibility | Free Plan/Trial | Refund |
$ 9.99/month – 12-month plan | Android, iOS | Free Demo | 60-Day Money-Back Guarantee |
A Spyic feature that stands out is call tracking; Spyic is near-perfect if you want info about the number of calls your employees make, the duration of each, and their timestamps. With access to all their incoming and outgoing calls, you’ll know whether they’re attending personal calls during office hours or being unproductive.
Like mSpy and EyeZy, Spyic has a prompt GPS tracker and geofencing alerts that notify you if your employees are somewhere they shouldn’t be when it’s time to work.
Other useful employee tracking features include web monitoring and SMS, social media, and SIM card tracking — Spyic will send you an alert if your employee tries to outwit you by inserting their own SIM card in the phone provided and paid for by the company.
Pricing
- 1-month plan: $49.99/month
- 3-month plan: $23.33/month
- 12-month plan: $9.99/month
Apart from this, Spyic also has a Basic and a Family plan with more device coverage and a few enterprise-level features, so check those out too.
Spyic provides a generous 60-day money-back guarantee in addition to a demo, so try it risk-free today.
Pros
- Can track 3-5 devices on a single subscription
- A long money-back guarantee period
- Offers a unique stealth mode
- Compatible across various devices
- Excellent remote monitoring capabilities
Cons
- Customer service can be slow at times
- Requires jailbreaking
The Best Time Management Apps Compared Side by Side – Which Tool is Right for You?
Based on our detailed reviews, you’ve probably already shortlisted your preferred time-tracking solutions. Here is a side-by-side comparison of the apps to help you make a final decision:
iOS 11 – 14.8.1 — with jailbreak All iOS Versions — without jailbreak
Time Tracking App
Starting Price
Compatibility
Free Plan/Trial
Money Back Guarantee
mSpy
$16.67/month
All Android 4+ Devices
Demo
14-day money-back guarantee
Spynger
$10.83/month
Android, iOS, tablets
No
14-day money-back guarantee
EyeZy
$9.99/month
Android, iOS, tablets
Demo, 3-day free trial
14-day money-back guarantee
uMobix
$12.66/month
Android, iOS, tablets
Live
14-day money-back guarantee
Salesforce
$25/month/user
Android, Windows, iPhone, iPad, and browsers
30-day free trial
NA
Pipedrive
$12/month/user
Android, Windows, iPhone, iPad, and browsers
14-day free trial
NA
Zoho CRM
$20/month/user
Android, Windows, iPhone, iPad, and browsers
Free plan; 15-day free trial
NA
Teramind
$10/month/user
Windows, Mac
Live demo, free plan, 14-day free trial
30-day money-back guarantee
ActivTrak
$10/month/user
Windows, Mac, ChromeOS
Free plan, 14-day trial
NA
HubStaff
$5.83/month/user
Windows, Mac, Android, iOS, Web
Free plan, demo, 14-day trial
60-day money-back guarantee
Flowace
$1.99/month/user
iOS, Android, Windows, MacOS, Linux (Ubuntu)
7-day free trial
NA
Spyic
$9.99/month
Android, iOS
Demo
60-day money-back guarantee
Dedicated time management apps like Teramind, Activtrak, Flowace, and Clockify are best suited to general purpose use, especially if you have a large team. Customer-facing teams that want to link time utilization to customer outcomes should rely on a CRM with robust time-tracking capabilities.
However, for investigative purposes or to alleviate specific doubts – for example, to confirm your suspicions about an employee’s behavior before putting them on a performance improvement plan (PIP) – a spy app is your best bet.
How We Tested Employee Time Tracking Software for this Guide
At TechReport, we are committed to helping businesses and regular users make the best decisions about which software to use. We understand that employee time-tracking technology is an essential part of your quality management processes. In this guide, we’ve shared our hands-on experience using 12 of the best software apps in this category.
We installed the entry-level monthly plan for each solution on an Android phone and tested the apps on iOS, Windows, MacOS, and Linux, as applicable. Next, we evaluated the feature set against the pricing to ensure that our shortlisted employee time-tracking apps deliver genuine value.
Our team has years of experience testing and writing about spy apps, CRM, and other tools to track employee performance – this informs our views, providing a wider industry understanding. We have also referred to trusted customer review forums like G2, Capterra, and Trustpilot to guarantee our insights are objective and unbiased.
Why Your Business Needs Time Tracking Software in 2024
By using any one of the 12 platforms we reviewed for this article, you’ll be able to:
How We Choose The Best Employee Time Tracking App?
To unlock these benefits, you need to choose the right employee time-tracking software for your organization. Here are the five key parameters that should guide your decision:
1. Scalability
With the right resources and business plan, your company will keep growing. So you need an employee tracking app that can grow with your company. Whatever time tracking app you pick should be able to handle a huge team of an enterprise just as well as they handle the team of a small business.
Choosing a scalable employee time-tracking app will ensure that your growth isn’t restricted by a lack of human resource management.
2. Filters & Customization
The more your company goes, the bigger your team will be. Powerful employee tracking apps like the ones mentioned above will do their best to extract every little piece of information about your team. While this information is certainly important, can you imagine the amount of data you will have to deal with on a day-to-day basis?
If you don’t want to waste your time looking for important data in a mountain of information, make sure your employee tracking app offers enough customizations and filters to help you navigate the piles of information and find the ones you are looking for in seconds.
3. Comprehensive Reporting
When you are responsible for running the whole business, you obviously won’t have the time to go through every little employee activity update. In that case, the best way to stay updated is through a tracking app that automatically creates reports on employee activity and productivity.
This way, you will have all the important highlights ready whenever you have the time to check instead of making your own list of important events of the week.
4. Automated Alerts
Even if the employee tracking app keeps everything ready for you to check, it’s practically impossible to get on the app every few minutes just to keep an eye on your employees. That’s why most popular tracking apps like Teramind have an automatic alerting feature under which you are immediately notified of employees being unproductive for too long.
Some of these tools will also let you send automated warnings in case your employees cater to their personal tasks during working hours.
5. Pricing
The best part about our list of employee tracking apps is there is something for every budget. Whether you want a cheap, beginner-level plan or a premium, customizable one for your enterprise-level need, our top 10 picks cover you well. After all, no matter how brilliant the app is, you cannot let it wreck your budget.
If you are not ready for any financial commitment yet, you can also use ActivTrak’s free plan to get accustomed to the tool first. Most of these tools also come with a live demo or free trial before moving to a paid plan.
Step-by-Step Guide to Set Up An Employee Time Tracking App
If you need a little help setting up your employee time-tracking app, here is a quick installation guide with Teramind:
- Visit the Teramind website and click on the “Free Trial” button on the top-right corner of the screen.
- A pop-up will ask you to enter your business email address. Enter your email to proceed to the next step.
- On the next page, you will have to enter more information about your business, like the number of employees you have, company phone number, company name, and your full name. On the same page, you can choose whether you want to self-host Teramind or opt for cloud hosting. Hit “Start Your Free Trial” once you have filled everything in.
- After your account has been created, log in to your dashboard. It will look something like the picture below.
- From here, you can get a complete overview of your employee’s activity or click on the categories in the left-side menu to examine specific parameters more closely.
Remember, every app works differently. However, since Teramind is one of the most beginner-friendly tools here with the best employee time-tracking features, we decided to give you an idea of how to go about it with Teramind as an example. You are free to pick any other tool you wish. ActivTrak, Hubstaff, and all the other apps are just as easy to set up.
Maximize Your Productivity Using Employee Time Tracking Technology
We’d love to fully trust our teammates and the people we hire – but unfortunately, most employees work best under a watchful eye. A good time-tracking software will give you the visibility you’re looking for, into performance, productivity, and time utilization.
With the right solution, you don’t have to worry about being intrusive or disturbing your employees when you monitor them. Employee time-tracking apps work in the background and collect crucial data on their activities – the apps employees visit, the websites they open, the files and customer contacts they’re working on, and more.
Most employee time-tracking tools come with a trial or free plan, or at least a money-back guarantee. Assess your requirements, pilot the time management app that meets your needs, and start rewarding proper time utilization as a central part of your company culture.
Employee Time Tracking Software FAQs
How can I track my employee’s time?
What is the #1 employee time tracking tool for daily office use?
What is the best time tracker software?
Is there a free app to track employee hours?
Are employee time-tracking apps legal?
References
Our Editorial Process