Five of the Best Programs for Tracking Your Time

Here's what to use if you really want to know how much time you spend working.

Many of the most popular productivity methods only really work if you know how much time each task is going to take you: Timeboxing, the Eisenhower matrix, Kanban, the Ivy Lee method, and others expect you to be able to plan for the precise amount of time a given project is going to suck from your day. If you estimate wrong, the whole plan kind of falls apart and you're left feeling discouraged and, well, unproductive. That’s where time trackers come in to help. Here are some of the best ones you can use when doing daily tasks to figure out how many of your precious waking hours are devoted to all the stuff you have to do. 

If you want to be detailed: Clockify

I’ve recommended Clockify for tracking your New Year's goals already, but it’s a longtime leader in the field. Lifehacker recommended it for tracking your time as far back as 2009, and it’s only improved since then. On the landing page, you’re greeted with a button that says, “START TRACKING TIME — IT’S FREE!” While Clockify does have a subscription model, if you want to be detailed in your time-tracking, you can just use the free version. It’s famous for being a timesheet app, but it allows you to track the minutes of all your work, producing a summary report for each day. (The reports can also tell you how much money was earned per project, how much money was spent per project, and all kinds of other relevant information.) You can even track time offline and it will appear in your account once you reconnect. 

If you want simplicity: TogglTrack

TogglTrack lets you use all of its premium features for free for a month (and a basic version is always free), and it’s simple to use. Other trackers have a learning curve or a steep price, which you don’t have time for when you’re trying to get things done, so this one is a pleasant surprise. I was able to quickly create a project (“Working on articles”) and then add a task (“Time-tracker article”) and put in an estimate of how long I thought it would take me. I hit a button next to the task and a timer started. Eventually, if I kept at it, my dashboard will fill up with my total hours of work, showing me just how much time I really spent. The free version is geared toward freelancers and works for up to five team members, who can use time tracking, a timeline, auto-tracking, idle detection, a pomodoro timer, and over 100 integrations with other software. For $9 per month, teams get all that plus billable rates, time rounding, time estimates, broken-out tasks, and project templates. An $18/month premium subscription will get you schedule reports, time audits, insights, and project and admin dashboards. 

To go at your own pace: TrackingTime

TrackingTime is nice because it has a few different functionalities. It can track you automatically or give you the option to block out time within the software, letting you see (and edit, of course) what needs to be done and how long you have to do it. It integrates with over 50 apps and other softwares so you can track while you work instead of opening TrackingTime to mark it down, and there’s a mobile app so you can take it on the go. Tracking time is free, but if you want to incorporate things like AutoTrack and desktops apps, it’ll be $8 per month. 

If you really don’t want to put effort into this: Timely

Timely is automated, so if you truly do not want to waste time tracking it, here you go. The software makes what it calls “memories” of everything you do on your computer, like software you use or websites you visit‚ and whenever you want, you can just drag and drop the memories into your pre-defined tasks. You don’t have to put every site you visit into the tasks; it’s all private and what you highlight is up to you—you can always toggle it off when you want to visit a certain site. It’s $11 per month to automate your time tracking, categorize time with an AI feature, and make reports, but $20 if you want to sync other project management tools. Just bear in mind this might not be the best option for you if a lot of your work takes place off the computer. 

If you need help staying on task: RescueTime

RescueTime is a time tracker that not only tracks your work, but kind of forces you to stay on it. This is helpful if you keep getting distracted and can make it easy to see how much time a task takes, instead of how much time a task plus all your forays away from the task take. You download the monitoring app to your computer and it collects data on your usage, but it chimes in if you appear distracted or like you’re doing too many things at once. You can even tell the software how much “Focus Work” (or deep work) you want to get done in a day and, once you toggle on a Focus Session, it will block websites you’ve pre-identified as distracting. There is a free version, but you’ll pay $12 per month if you want to see past data, integrate a calendar, or use Focus Sessions.