The best time clock software lets employers abandon Excel spreadsheets, eliminate time theft, access detailed reports on how employees spend their time, save on administrative and labor costs, prevent buddy punching, free your HR team up to focus on more strategic tasks, and much more.
But with hundreds of time clock apps available on the market, finding the right one for your business can be challenging.
To help, we’ve compiled this list of the best time clock software for work. See side-by-side comparisons of the different apps, explaining what type of business each app is best for, what unique features each app offers, and how the apps compare on price.
The 9 best time clock software in 2024
Whether you’re looking for time clock software that’s free, easy to use, built for your industry, or integrates with your other systems, one of the nine options below should meet your needs:
- Buddy Punch – Best overall time clock software
- QuickBooks Time – Best for QuickBooks Payroll Premium or Elite customers
- ADP – Best for biometric clock-in features
- Time Doctor – Best for companies that employ knowledge workers
- Clockify – Best free option for basic employee time tracking
- Timely – Best for agencies and professional services businesses
- Toggl Track – Best for companies looking for a Windows desktop app
- Paymo – Best for combined time tracking and project management
- BusyBusy – Best free time clock that includes GPS tracking
To choose the apps on this list, we reviewed dozens of options and compared them on pricing, features, and usability.
We wanted to make sure to offer a range of unique options and not just a handful of apps that all do the same thing so it’s easier to decide which app is best for your business.
We also wanted to make sure the apps were easy to use. Since not all employees are technically savvy, we wanted to make sure that the apps we recommend are simple to use by both employees and administrators so the app saves time rather than creating more work.
Finally, we looked for apps that were priced reasonably for the features they offer so we could include options that work best for small businesses with small budgets and large businesses with complex needs.
1. Buddy Punch
Best overall time clock software.
Buddy Punch sits at the top of our list due to its ease of use for both employers and employees, its wide range of features that make it useful for employers in many different industries, and its competitive pricing in the space.
In terms of features, Buddy Punch has all of the basic and more advanced features you need to manage hours and track your team’s time.
Employee scheduling
Use Buddy Punch’s drag-and-drop work scheduling software to easily create shift patterns and get full control over your employees’ work schedules. Any edits to the schedule immediately notify employees of shift changes.
Shift trades
Employees can request shift trades when needed. Shift trade requests are then sent to managers for approval or rejection.
Time-off-tracking
Buddy Punch automatically calculates PTO accruals for you. Employees can submit time off requests for both paid and unpaid time off and have it sent to their managers for approval or rejection.
Clocking in and out
Employees can easily clock in and out using Buddy Punch. The time they spend working can also be automatically assigned to specific job codes. Employers can pull reports for things like employee attendance and employee work hours.
Overtime management
Create custom rules to calculate overtime based on your location, work week, or company policies. Plus, you can get notifications when employees are nearing overtime to save on labor costs.
Payroll integrations
Sync your employee time sheets directly to your payroll provider. Buddy Punch integrates directly with platforms like QuickBooks, ADP, Gusto, Paychex, Workday, and more.
Location-based time tracking
If your employees work on job sites or in multiple locations, you can use GPS tracking to log where they’re spending their time. Or you can set up geofencing to prevent employees from clocking in or out when they’re not on location.
Time theft prevention
Capture a picture of employees when they clock in and out to avoid time theft practices like buddy punching, or restrict clocking in and out to specific locations or while on approved IP addresses.
Assign costs to specific jobs
Create jobs, companies, or any type of label to assign employee time toward. Time spent at each job will be reflected on employee time cards and exportable reports.
Enforce breaks
Set up customizable rules that specify how many hours your employees need to work before breaks and how long their breaks should be, and Buddy Punch will automatically deduct that time from the employee’s time card.
The variety of simple and more complex features in Buddy Punch makes it ideal for both single-location businesses with a handful of employees and client-based businesses with hundreds of employees working in different locations.
Finally, Buddy Punch has some of the highest ratings for ease of use and customer support in the entire time clock software category, with an overall 4.8 out of 5-star rating on Capterra across nearly 1,000 user reviews.
Pricing
Buddy Punch is one of the lowest-cost time clock software on this list given its breadth of features, with pricing starting at $3.99 per user per month plus a $19 base fee.
Want to learn more about Buddy Punch? Start a free trial, watch a recorded demo, or request a personalized demo.
2. QuickBooks Time
Best time clock software for companies using QuickBooks Payroll Premium or Elite.
In terms of features, QuickBooks Time is very similar to Buddy Punch. With it, you get basic features like employee hours and attendance tracking, employee scheduling, PTO/leave tracking, and overtime calculations, plus more advanced features like geofencing, photo attachments, and mileage tracking.
Another big feature of QuickBooks’ time clock software is that it integrates natively with Intuit’s QuickBooks payroll products. This eliminates the need to install a separate integration to connect your employee time-tracking tool to your accounting software — the data automatically syncs between the two systems.
With that said, QuickBooks Time comes with a much larger price tag than many of the other options on this list, so if you’re looking for a standalone online time clock app, it might not make the most sense for your budget.
However, if you’re already using QuickBooks Payroll software and pay for either the Premium or Elite package, QuickBooks Time is included as a free add-on product. So unless QuickBooks Time is missing a feature you need, it’s probably the best pick for your business.
Pricing
QuickBooks Time’s plans start at $8 per user per month, plus a $20 per month base fee. There’s also a three-month discount offered to new customers that reduces the base fee to $6 per user.
3. ADP
Best payroll and time clock software for biometric login options.
If security is a major concern for your business — or if employee time theft is a serious problem — ADP offers several unique biometric login options that can prevent anyone other than your employees from accessing your building or clocking in and out for shifts.
Using an on-site ADP kiosk, iPad, or Android tablet, ADP’s time clock system can use technologies like facial recognition, fingerprint scanning, and even voice recognition to allow employees access to locations or the ability to punch in and out for work shifts.
Additionally, if you’re already using ADP for HR and payroll processing, your ADP time clock software will integrate seamlessly with the other ADP tools you use.
In general, though, ADP is designed to be used by large businesses with complex needs. Its time clock software is part of a full workforce management suite that includes employee time tracking, payroll processing, human resources management, and tax solutions.
Pricing
No public pricing is available; contact ADP for a quote.
4. Time Doctor
Best time clock solution for companies that employ knowledge workers.
Time Doctor is more of a productivity tracking tool than traditional time clock software, helping businesses that employ salaried knowledge workers keep a pulse on how employee hours are being spent.
Employers can use Time Doctor to see things like how much time employees are spending on specific types of tasks, which apps they use for work most often, and which websites they’re spending the most time on.
This helps them identify where time is being wasted, where more help is needed, which apps are not used often and can be removed/canceled, how often hardware or connectivity issues are causing dips in productivity, and which employees struggle with work-life balance by working too many hours or not taking breaks.
This all makes Time Doctor a great option for software and other fully remote companies that are less concerned with tracking the specific hours employees work and more concerned with how employees spend their time while they’re working.
Pricing
Time Doctor’s plans start at $5.90 per user per month when paid for annually.
5. Clockify
Best free time clock app for basic employee time tracking.
If you’re looking for simple, free time clock software, Clockify might be the right option.
Its forever-free plan comes with unlimited users and projects and provides basic features like employee time tracking, timesheets, Pomodoro timers, and team activity reports and exports. This makes it a viable option for small businesses with very basic needs.
Other common time clock software features — like GPS tracking, PTO management, payroll system integrations, forecasting, and kiosks — are also available, though only on Clockify’s premium plans.
Overall, Clockify can be used as a combined time-tracking and project-management tool. You can create projects and tasks in Clockify, then when employees clock in, they can select which project/task they’re working on. This helps you connect employee time to tasks and projects easily for accurate invoicing and billing.
Pricing
Limited functionality is available on Clockify’s free-forever plan; paid plans start at $3.99 per user/month.
6. Timely
Best time clock software for agencies.
Time tracking for agencies and consulting businesses can get very complex because employees may be spending time on multiple clients over the course of the day — and sometimes from minute to minute.
Timely helps solve this problem by capturing every second of your employees’ work days, ensuring no billable time goes unbilled. Employees can select which project, client, or task that each recorded section of time belongs to.
However, Timely also has AI features that limit the amount of manual work employees have to do to track their time. Over time, it learns which projects/clients specific meetings and activities belong to and automatically sorts them into the right categories.
Finally, if an employee forgets what they spent their time on that day, Timely’s memory tracker can be used to see what apps or URLs they were viewing during specific times of the day, allowing them to quickly identify how long they spent on different clients and projects.
Pricing
Timely’s plans start at $9 per user per month when paid for annually.
7. Toggl Track
Best employee time clock software for companies looking for a Windows-specific app.
All of the time clock apps on this list offer web-based apps, which means they’ll work on any device that has an internet connection. However, if you have employees using devices that don’t have internet access, you may need to opt for a tool that offers desktop app options.
Toggl Track may be the right option for you as it’s one of the few time clock software systems that offers a Windows desktop app. It can be used whether employees are connected to the internet or not, ensuring they’re able to clock in and out and track their time regardless of where they’re working.
As far as time-tracking features, Toggl Track is another app that’s designed for employee time and productivity tracking. It has an idle detection feature that can determine when employees are clocked in but not working, as well as alerts that will remind employees to clock in and out when they’re working/not working.
These features can help you save on labor costs and avoid making manual changes to time cards. You can track employee work hours automatically, attach employee time entries to specific tasks and projects, and integrate your time-tracking data with tools like Trello, Asana, Slack, and Google Calendar.
Pricing
Toggl Track pricing: Free plan available for up to five users; paid plans start at $9 per user/month.
8. Paymo
Best for teams that need employee time tracking and project management in one tool.
If what your business needs most is a single tool you can use to manage projects and track time, Paymo might be just the thing. It comes with all of the project management features you’d expect — Gantt charts, Kanban boards, to-do lists, and task calendars — as well as time-tracking, team scheduling, and timesheets.
Paymo is really a great all-in-one time tracking tool for agencies and consulting businesses. In addition to time tracking and project management, you can send online invoices, create estimates from project plans, track expenses, measure employee performance, and see which of your clients is the most profitable.
And if you run a very small professional services business, Paymo’s free plan may include everything you need from your employee time clock software. On it, you can add unlimited employees and tasks for up to five clients and 10 projects, which may be sufficient for small agencies and consultancies.
Paymo also integrates with several of the tools these types of businesses use, including Google Calendar, Slack, QuickBooks, Xero, Typeform, Lambda Test, PomoDone, and Shift.
Pricing
Paymo has a free plan that’s available for up to five clients and 10 projects; paid plans start at $5.90 per user/month.
9. BusyBusy
Best free GPS time tracking software.
BusyBusy is built specifically for off-site construction businesses and has lots of features designed to help you manage employee time, keep track of project progress, prevent buddy punching, and reduce labor costs.
Real-time GPS features can show you where all of your employees and equipment are on a map. Geofencing is available to prevent employees from clocking in before they’re on job sites. And location-based reminders will notify employees if they’ve left a job site without clocking out.
BusyBusy can also house documents and pictures. Documents keep all of your critical project files in one place, and pictures let you keep track of the progress of a project.
Your employees can clock in and clock out using an app on their mobile devices (iOS and Android apps are both available), or you can set up a device as a kiosk for punching in and out. Kiosk mode also allows you to set up facial recognition that will notify an admin if an employee clocks in for someone else.
Pricing
BusyBusy’s free forever plan includes GPS time tracking, job costing, and equipment tracking for unlimited users. Its paid plans start at $9.99 per user/month and include scheduling, photos, notes, and supervisor tools.
Choosing the right employee time clock software
In addition to the information provided above, you may want to consider these additional factors to ensure you select the right time clock software for your needs:
- Features: Look for essential features such as clock-in/clock-out functionality, timesheet management, overtime tracking, and reporting capabilities. Additionally, consider if you need more advanced features like geolocation tracking, biometric authentication, or integration with payroll systems.
- Ease of use: The software should be intuitive and user-friendly for both administrators and employees. A clean interface and easy navigation can save time and reduce errors in employee time tracking.
- Scalability: Consider whether the software can scale with your business as it grows. It should be able to accommodate an increasing number of employees and locations if necessary.
- Compatibility: Ensure that the software is compatible with your existing hardware (e.g., computers, tablets, smartphones) and operating systems. Additionally, if you’re planning to integrate it with other systems like payroll or HR software, direct integrations are crucial.
- Mobile accessibility: If your employees work remotely or in the field, mobile accessibility is essential. Look for software that offers mobile apps or responsive web interfaces for convenient employee time tracking on the go.
- Security: Time clock data contains sensitive information, so security is paramount. Make sure the software offers robust security measures such as encryption, role-based access control, and regular data backups to protect employee data.
- Compliance: Ensure that the software complies with relevant labor laws and regulations in your jurisdiction, especially regarding overtime, breaks, and record-keeping requirements.
Finally, make sure to consider both the short-term and long-term costs of the software you’re considering.
When you’re buying time clock software for the first time, free products can be enticing. However, these platforms can be difficult to migrate away from down the line when it’s time to upgrade to a paid plan, and the paid plan may be significantly more expensive than other comparable products.
You’ll be much better off buying the right tool for what you might need a year from now than having to redo your entire employee time tracking and payroll setup later in order to switch to a better tool.
