Project Management Software with Time Tracking: What to Look ForProject Management Software with Time Tracking: What to Look For

Project management software with time tracking lets people log hours against the same tasks they plan and deliver, so effort, progress and cost live in one place. That sounds like a checkbox feature, and on most comparison grids it is shown as one. In practice the differences between tools are large: whether time attaches to the task or just to a project, whether timesheets can be approved and locked, whether planned and actual hours can be compared, and whether the feature is in your plan at all or sold as an add-on.

This guide is for teams choosing software. It covers what to decide before you look at vendors, the evaluation criteria that separate useful time tracking from a stopwatch bolted onto a task list, a weighted scorecard and a two-week trial plan. If you have already picked a tool and want to run timesheets, capacity and forecasting well, read our companion guide to project time tracking and resource planning.

Start with what you need the hours for

Teams buy time tracking for different reasons, and each reason points to different features. Agree on your top one or two before looking at demos, or you will score tools on features you never use.

If billing is the goal, the approval workflow and locked periods matter more than a slick timer. If estimation is the goal, time must attach to individual work items or the comparison is meaningless.

Native, integrated or separate: three ways to get time tracking

Before comparing features, decide which architecture you are willing to run. Each has a place.

Add-on billing deserves a careful look. On some platforms an add-on is priced on the host product’s total user count. Atlassian’s documentation, checked in October 2026, says Marketplace apps for Jira are priced on the maximum number of Jira users on the site, so a timesheet app needed by a few people may be billed for everyone. Our guide to project management software pricing shows how to model this in a total-cost comparison.

Evaluation criteria that actually separate tools

1. Time entry people will actually use

Accuracy depends on how easy it is to log time. Look for entry straight from a task and a weekly grid for people who log in batches, plus the ability to copy a recurring week rather than retype it. Check how many clicks a typical day takes. If logging a day’s work takes more than a minute or two, people will reconstruct it from memory on Friday, and the data will drift.

2. A real timesheet workflow

For billing, payroll or capacity planning you need more than raw entries. Check whether people can submit a week and managers can approve or return it with a comment in one place. Ask whether approved periods are locked, and whether corrections leave an audit trail. Reminders and digests for missing timesheets save managers from chasing people by message.

3. Estimates and planned versus actual

The most valuable report most teams never get is planned versus actual effort, by task, project and person. Check whether the tool stores an estimate on each work item, whether actuals roll up from logged time, and whether the comparison uses approved hours only. Without approval, unreviewed entries quietly distort the numbers.

4. Capacity and workload

Time tracking looks backward; capacity looks forward. A tool that knows each person’s working schedule, leave and public holidays can show expected hours against logged and estimated hours, and highlight who is overloaded before work is assigned. This is where time tracking turns into resource planning.

5. Reporting and export

Check that reports can be filtered by project, client, person, period and type of work, and that views can be saved for repeat use. Make sure data exports to CSV or through an API for invoicing, payroll or finance. Then run the report your finance or delivery lead actually needs during the trial, not the one in the demo.

6. Permissions and privacy

Decide who can see whose hours. Many teams want individuals to see their own time, managers to see their team, and finance to see totals by project, but not everyone to see everyone. Role-based and field-level permissions make that possible without separate tools.

7. Migration of existing time data

If you are switching tools, historical worklogs matter for estimates and client history. Ask whether the importer brings worklogs across with the work items they belong to, and test it on a sample before committing.

8. Plan placement and total cost

Confirm which plan includes time entry, which includes approvals and capacity, and which includes the reports you need. The answer is often three different tiers. Price the tier that covers your must-haves for every user who needs it.

A weighted scorecard you can copy

Score each shortlisted tool from 1 to 5 on each criterion, multiply by the weight, and add up the results. The weights below are an illustrative starting point for a services team that bills clients; adjust them to your main goal so they total 100.

A worked illustration: Tool X scores 5 on entry, 3 on workflow, 4 on planned vs actual, 2 on capacity, 4 on reporting, 4 on permissions, 3 on migration and 3 on cost, for a total of 360 out of 500. Tool Y scores 4, 5, 4, 4, 3, 4, 4, 4 for 410. Tool X has the nicer timer, but Tool Y fits a team that bills clients and plans capacity. Scoring makes that trade-off visible instead of leaving it to whoever ran the best demo.

Red flags in demos and trials

• Time can only be logged against a project, not a task, so estimates and actuals cannot be compared.
• Approvals exist but approved entries can still be edited without a trace.
• The planned-versus-actual report is only available on a higher tier than the one you were quoted.
• Capacity is a manual number per person that ignores leave and holidays.
• Exports require a support request or produce data that needs heavy cleaning.
• The demo account is on the top tier, and nobody can tell you which features your plan lacks.

Run a two-week trial with real work

1. 1.Pick one live project and a mixed group: two or three people who do the work, one approver and someone from finance or operations.
2. 2.Set up the project with your real task structure and estimates, not a template.
3. 3.Have everyone log time daily for two weeks using the method they would actually use.
4. 4.Run one approval cycle at the end of each week, including returning at least one timesheet for correction.
5. 5.At the end, produce three outputs: planned vs actual for the project, next week’s workload by person, and the report finance needs.
6. 6.Ask the group to score the tool on the scorecard and note anything they worked around.

Different teams should emphasize different outputs. A digital agency should check that hours by client export cleanly for invoicing. A SaaS product team should compare estimated and actual effort across a sprint; our sprint planning guide shows how that feeds the next plan. An IT support team should check how easily people log short, unplanned work without creating a task for every interruption.

Getting adoption right

The best tool still fails if people see time tracking as surveillance. Explain what the data is for and who will see it, keep categories few, and show the team how the numbers improve their own plans. Hours logged are an input, not a measure of performance; use them alongside delivery measures such as cycle time and on-time completion, covered in our guide to project management KPIs.

Where QuikProjects fits

QuikProjects treats time tracking as part of project work rather than a separate app. People log time in a weekly grid or straight from a task, and can copy last week’s timesheet in one click. Managers approve timesheets in one place, and reminders and a daily digest keep them complete. Capacity updates from working schedules and holidays, and a resource report shows expected, spent and estimated hours for every person, with overload highlighted. Planned-versus-actual reports by project and person are built from approved timesheets. Saved views and CSV export cover reporting, and custom roles with field-level permissions control who sees what.

Time tracking is included on the Free plan, which covers up to 10 users. Advanced time tracking, including timesheet approvals, is on Pro at $5 per user per month billed annually, alongside test management and AI agents; see the current plans. Teams moving from Jira can bring worklogs across with the built-in importer, which runs a dry run first. Run it through the same scorecard and trial as any other option.

Frequently asked questions

Do we need a separate time tracking app if our project tool has one?

Not usually. A native feature is enough if it links time to tasks, supports approvals and gives you the reports you need. A separate app makes sense when you need deep payroll or invoicing features the project tool lacks, and you are willing to maintain the integration.

Is a timer better than manual timesheets?

Timers suit people who switch between a few long tasks and remember to start them. Weekly grids suit people who log in batches or juggle many short tasks. Most teams need both, which is why entry options are worth testing with real users rather than judged in a demo.

What’s the difference between time tracking and resource planning software?

Time tracking records hours already spent. Resource planning uses capacity, schedules and estimates to decide who should work on what next. The most useful tools connect them, so actual hours improve future plans. Our companion guide on running time tracking and resource planning, linked in the introduction, covers the practice in detail.

The bottom line

Choose project management software with time tracking based on what you need the hours for. Then test the details that matter: entry people will use, approvals that lock, planned versus actual from approved time, capacity that knows about leave, and pricing that includes all of it on the tier you will actually buy. Score shortlisted tools on a real project for two weeks, and the right choice usually becomes obvious. For the wider picture of planning and running projects, see our complete project management guide.

Want to try time tracking that lives next to the work? Start QuikProjects free for up to 10 users, or trial Pro for 14 days with no credit card.

Sources

• Atlassian Support: Understand billing for Marketplace apps