Cloud solutions for time tracking are really popular today, but still there are users who prefer desktop software. Some consider it secure to keep all the time tracking and billing data on the local computer. Others just want the browser apps for automatic time tracking in the background.
So, we made a list of time tracking software for Mac that will help you monitor your productivity and collect accurate data to bill your clients.
1. actiTIME
Apr 09, 2020 Rescue Time, Toggl, and Timing for Mac are probably your best bets out of the 9 options considered. 'Simple setup' is the primary reason people pick Rescue Time over the competition. This page is powered by a knowledgeable community that helps you make an informed decision. Not to mention all the small touches that help the app feel modern, like haptic feedback, a dark mode, alternate icons, color theme options, iPad Split View, and more. If you’re looking for a simple, one-time-purchase app to meet your calorie tracking needs, look no further than Calory. Simple time tracking app for Windows, Mac, Linux which helps you to control your time, increase productivity, monitor your team performance. Try it for free! Free Time Tracking Software & App - TMetric.
Key features:
- Time tracking
- Productivity reports
- Project and task planning
- Billing and payroll
actiTIME is a high-quality piece of timesheet and work management software for both small and large teams alike. The tool can be accessed from any device and operating system, which means that Mac OS X users can easily implement it to boost productivity and performance efficiency as well.
The desktop version of the tool supports only the manual time tracking mode. However, you may also download the Chrome extension and track hours with an automatic timer to avoid distractions and maximize data entry accuracy.
It was an intuitive choice, which offered us good usability and attractive interface. We searched the Internet, looked for comments, and actiTIME seemed a worthy choice to try. And now we are happy that we use it. We ourselves are an IT development and services company, and we never had any complaints about the tool from our employees. And this we think is a good measuring criterion!
2. Timing
Key features:
- Automatic time tracking
- Reports and charts
- Billing
This app monitors how you use your Mac and categorizes all detected activities. In this way, you get an informative report on your time expenses. The app also supports manual time entry and keeps track of when you are most productive. Colorful charts show when and how you spent your time throughout the day. Timing also provides special reports for calculation of billable amounts directly in the app.
Timing works in the background, so it is unobtrusive and allows you to focus on your work, not on tracking time. And it provides you with detailed data on your time expenses to improve your productivity in the future.
3. On The Job
Key features:
- Time tracking
- Data organization
- Client profile management
- Billing in multiple currencies
Another app that can be installed on Mac OS X, On The Job counts time expenses with a timer. Automatic idle time detector helps calculate time intervals when no activity is performed on the computer and shows it when you return – with an option to subtract idle time from the total value.
For client billing, the app provides multiple currencies and custom hourly rates. Once the billable amount is created, you can issue an invoice directly in the app. Customize your invoices as you need by adding graphical elements and editing texts.
4. Tyme
Key features:
- Time tracking
- Cost tracking
- Reporting
- Billing
Tyme is a simple and clear app for Mac OS, iPhone and iPad, synchronizing data between devices. Thus, it allows for time tracking from any Apple device and supports many different time tracking modes, including the automatic ones. Besides, it assists in cost and mileage monitoring and generates insightful time use statistics reviews. It enables users to sort projects and tasks by their specific parameters to eliminate chaos from your work.
Tyme also keeps track of already billed periods to prevent you from accidental double billing. In addition, the app forecasts future workloads based on the collected data.
5. Billings Pro
Key features:
- Time tracking
- Reports
- Billing and invoicing
One more app for MAc takes the pain out of keeping track of work time and billing clients. The app allows to capture work hours and minutes with a timer, prepare cost estimates for customers and issue invoices based on the recorded work time. It works on Mac and iOS devices and allows to track time and create invoices directly from your phone or tablet on the go.
The tool also features simple reports that provide managers and regular employees with insights into how time has been spent on various tasks and projects. As the app is focused on billing and invoicing, it also provides information on amounts billable to customers for time spent on their work assignments.
6. timeEdition
Key features:
- Time tracking
- Task planning
- Billing
This app is a time tracker for Mac, iOS and Android is focused on the ease of use and accuracy of records. For accurate timekeeping, a timer is used that counts time spent on various tasks. Later, you can manually edit or adjust entries. Use color coding to differentiate tasks between clients, set up deadline reminders and make notes to your records.
timeEdition apps are synced via Dropbox so that you have all collected data at hand on all your devices. The app also supports data export to Excel and allows synchronization with iCal and Google Calendar.
7. HR
Key features:
- Time tracking
- Simple project organization
- Data export
HR timer is a minimalistic app that counts your work time. It runs in the background and opens when you need it from the menu bar. The app records time with a timer (it is possible to start several timers simultaneously) that can be automatically paused when detecting idle time or after a specified period of time – according to the pomodoro technique.
The tool allows you to categorize your projects to keep your project list organized. You can export your data from the app into CSV format by task or by category for further usage and analysis.
8. Caato
Key features:
- Automatic time tracking
- Simple task management
- Billing
The tool is designed specifically for Mac OS and is meant to release users from manual time tracking chores: it provides an easy way to break down your projects by tasks and track time against them with a timer. Entries can be later edited, and new entries for future can be added.
Caato allows to track billable time down to a second and get totals for necessary projects or date ranges. Excel and CSV export is available too. The tool is really helpful both for freelancers who need to calculate billable time and office employees who track their personal time to measure their productivity.
9. Time Sink
Key features:
- Automatic time tracking
- Productivity trends analysis
Time Sink is a time tracker and organizer for Mac OS X that helps you understand where the time goes. The app automatically records the time you spend in applications and windows on your Mac. You don’t need to enter anything manually. If a non-Mac activity needs to be tracked, you can start a separate timer, unrelated to an application on your computer.
The tool allows you to get an overview of time expenses for related activities. With the Pool feature, you can keep track of how long you have been working on a specific project – or learn how much time you spent on all types of distracting activities. A Pool is just a collection of related windows, created by dragging and dropping them to the app’s Pools section. This feature proves to be helpful for productivity analysis.
10. Timelime
Key features:
- Time tracking
- Task planning
- Data management
Timelime is a personal time tracking app available for both Mac OS X and iOS. You can use it on your desktop and on your phone to record your time expenses from anywhere – the data is synchronized in iCloud or Dropbox.
The tool offers many helpful features, such as undo/ redo, notes to tasks and timings, data import and export, backups and more. Timelime is a robust tool for everyone who needs to monitor their daily activities: freelancers, independent contractors, students, office employees and anyone who wishes to visualize their time expenses and increase productivity.
Previously, we had covered the best time-tracking Android apps for freelancing. But the problem with a smartphone app is that you should have the device alongside — which can be a distraction. That is why we need a desktop time tracking app, with features like automated tracking.
In this article, we will be talking about the best time-tracking apps for Mac. Some of these are dedicated Mac apps while others are fully-fledged services. Anyway, regardless of who you are — a freelancer or a project manager —, you will find a suitable app on the list. Shall we start?
Also Read: Best Timer Apps for Mac For Every Need
Best Time Tracking Apps for Mac
1. Toggl — Best Mac Time Tracker for Freelancers
Toggl was also present when we covered the best Android apps for time-tracking, remember? Well, Toggl is a cross-platform app available as a Mobile app (iOS, Android), Desktop app (Win, Mac, Linux) and even as Browser Extensions for Chrome and Firefox. So, if you are looking for time tracker that works everywhere, Toggl is a good place to start.
Toggl works like most time tracker apps, you open the app, create a new entry for the project you are working on, and start the timer. Toggl will start counting seconds and minutes. Once you are done, press the stop button, and the total amount of time is saved to your Toggl account. There are a few advanced features too if you’re interested.
The UI has been kept as clean as it can be. It displays a list of the activities you’ve done and are doing right now. At the same time, if you are looking for a detailed report, Toggle has a fully-fledged web interface — a quite feature-rich one.
Simple Time Tracking App Mac Free
Coming to Team Integration, most features in Toggl are available in the Enterprise version. Thanks to Team Dashboard, however, you can easily manage team members, their projects and insider activities.
In the free version you get, core time-tracking tools, idle detection, and you can manage up to five teams. The paid plans start at $9 per month. You can find the pricing details here.
Pros: Impressive & Simple UI, Integrates well with macOS, Pomodoro timer,
Cons: None worth noting
Who is it for: While Toggl is made for both teams and individuals, we think freelancers would find the tool more appropriate. Compared to other time-trackers for Mac, Toggl has a cleaner interface and offers an easy way to manage time-slots.
Check Out Toggl (Free; Paid Plans start at $9/Month)
2. Harvest — Best Mac Time Tracker for Teams
Harvest is undoubtedly one of the fully-fledged time tracking software for macOS. It has primarily been built for Teams, but individual use is also fine. Just so you know, Harvest for macOS is a part of the overall Harvest package. You can access and modify your data from multiple devices, including Windows, Android, and iOS. As far as the macOS app is concerned, it doesn’t have a proper window by default.
You can access the Harvest app from the menu-bar of macOS. In a single click, you can provide all the details and start a certain project. Harvest would be showing the elapsed time on the menu-bar as long as the task is running.
In order to access features like Invoicing and Expense Management, you will have to visit the web interface of Harvest. There, you can get comprehensive reports as well, subject to the plan you’re running. The best part about Harvest is that it keeps all the necessary features behind an intuitive UI. Like, a user can decide not to use the features if they want something simple.
Pros: An intuitive UI, Better invoicing and Timesheet support, Menu-bar integration
Cons: Not-so suitable for individuals
Who is it for: Unlike Toggle, Harvest is the better choice for teams out there. It ticks all the necessary boxes when it comes to enterprise-level features and still offers a simple UI for managing everything. So, if you have a team and you want them to have the best time-tracking experience, go for Harvest.
Check Out Harvest (Free; Team plans start at $12/Person/Month)
3. Timing — Best Automated Time Tracker for macOS
Timing is one of the best apps I’ve personally loved using on my Mac. It really helps in automating the time-tracking process. You don’t have to worry about starting or stopping the timers. Everything you do on Mac would be tracked and analyzed. At the end of the day, you’d know where you spent your time. Timing also automates the labeling process.
Simple Time Tracking App Mac Computer
There isn’t anything fancy about the UI of Timing. Once you have opened the app, you can see an icon with a timer on the menu-bar. It works as a quick menu for starting and stopping certain tasks. It’s completely up to you to create the task beforehand; Timing works otherwise too.
Probably the best part about Timing is that it provides an overview of your time. You’d know where every second of yours was spent. At the end of the day, you can drag and drop time-slots to individual projects or tasks. You can even add tasks that you did outside the Mac, you know. Last but not the least, Timing offers some superb reporting features as well.
Pros: Fully automated; deeper, app-level tracking, native macOS app
Cons: None worth noting
Who is it for: Timing is the perfect time-tracking app for freelancers. I, for one, have been using it for a long time, probably due to the automation feature. Despite the deep tracking features, Timing is quite flexible as well.
Computer Tracking Software Mac
Check Out Timing (Freemium; Basic version starts at $39)
4. Clockify — Best Free Time Tracker for Teams
It’s tough to find a completely free time-tracking app for teams. Clockify is indeed an exception here. You’d be able to use the service and the apps for tracking hourly time, as much time as you want. Unlike some of the other free plans, Clockify does not have limits on the number of users. While it’s predominantly a SaaS, the macOS app is pretty good too.
You can easily add the task and start working on it. You can minimize the window and have a look at overall spent time via the menu-bar itself. It should be noted that the whole UI is pretty minimal. Most of the work take place under the hood.
Clockify Desktop as a simple client for time-tracking. You and your team can visit the web-based interface to do reporting and analysis. From the visual breakdown of time consumption to time-sheet data export, a lot of features are available in this package. It’s also one of the most used team time-tracking solutions out there in the market.
Pros: Completely free, simple UI, Sufficient features
Cons: The Desktop client is too basic.
Who is it for: We’d recommend Clockify to everyone who needs a completely free macOS time-tracker for teams. If you have an office with a few iMacs for work, you should consider getting Clockify — it comes with no limits.
Check Out Clockify (Free)
5. Timely — Best Time Tracking App with Scheduling
There are times when you want to not just track time but schedule how you spend it. Timely is the best way to do both. It packs enough features for planning your tasks ahead and tracking where you spend your daily time. It should be noted that Timely works automatically — from suggesting you the project names to adding the entries, everything is as per schedule.
The UI of Timely does not have anything fancy to offer. Everything has been kept as minimal as possible. The UI even resembles that of Timing, another automatic time-tracking app we listed above. You can go through the different tabs to explore different sections of tracking.
We think it’s like having Timing for a team. In Timely, everything is synced with the server and your team. It can really help when it comes to team-based project management. Even if you’re a solo performer, there is a lot of options for scheduling. Thanks to the power of AI, Timely can track even the slightest activities that you are doing inside each app.
Pros: Completely automated, scheduling options, AI-powered
Cons: Learning curve is steep
Who is it for: If you want to improve the accuracy of time-tracking, enable scheduling and make things better altogether, Timely is a great option for you. It’s not the most affordable tracker out there, though. However, you are getting a fully-fledged macOS client.
Check Out Timely (Plans start at $7/month for an individual)
Free Time Tracking Apps
Which is the best time tracking apps for Mac?
Depending on what exactly you are looking for, you can pick one from the above options. If you happen to be a busy freelancer, the choice is pretty easy, since you can go for Toggl. On the other hand, if you want an automated system, we’d recommend Timing or Timely — based on whether you’re a team or a one-player army. All these apps can offer standard time tracking features on macOS. Nevertheless, we recommend picking one that suits your requirements.
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