Top time tracking apps for software house

Software product development comes with many challenges. From proper project management and changing scope creep to ensuring accurate development and meeting deadlines. Juggling all these issues can be demanding and can slow down your work.

According to statistics, software development market is expected to reach $1039 million by 2027 with a CAGR (compound annual growth rate) of $22.54% from 2020 to 2027. This constant growth will cause more demand for the services of software houses. This, however, will be followed by more challenges.

But you can stay on top with the right time tracker. Here's your short guide on the best time tracking tools for software houses.

Why use time tracking software?

If you're a software developer, you may consider time tracking software as an unnecessary burden. And you may be right—logging hours, filling spreadsheets with numbers, and spending extra time on admin work can be a real drudge.

But the right time tracker can help you automate work and eliminate all the unnecessary labor.

Here are all the benefits of tracking time in software development:

• Automated time tracking: With the right time tracker, you don't have to remember to manually log work hours. It will automatically track time spent on work.
• Effective project time tracking: Monitoring real-time data gives you updates on work. That way, you can avoid scope creep.
• Accurate estimates: You can compare tracked time with planned work and use the data to estimate future projects.
• Performance management: Time tracking helps to spot distractions and inefficiencies to improve team performance.
• Transparency: Having access to all project data helps to keep all team members on the same page.
• Billable hours tracking: Tracking billable time helps with accurate invoicing, spotting financial bottlenecks, better project management, and estimating project profitability.
• Employee time clock app: If your team needs to clock-in/out their work hours, a time tracker can automatically register them.

Overall, the right time tracker helps to improve time management. And the better your time management, the better your results.

‍The best time tracking tools

‍There are so many employee time tracking apps on the market that it may be hard to choose from all the options. Selecting the wrong tool can bring more harm than good. And if you're a software developer, you don't need any additional work.When you decide to use a time management tool, make sure to look for 4 features that will make your work effective:

1. Automatic time tracking to avoid manual data entry.
2. Reports and analytics for smart decision-making.
3. Integrations to connect it to your favorite tools and apps.
4. Project management tools so you can organize projects and track time to them.

Here's a brief list of the best time tracking software for all types of software houses:

‍1. TimeCamp

‍TimeCamp is a free time tracking app for unlimited use TimeCamp is a free time tracking app for unlimited users and unlimited projects. It's a robust system but easy to use at the same time. It has a user-friendly interface that doesn't require any onboarding and has zero learning-curve.

TimeCamp allows you to organize all your projects into tasks and subtasks with a hierarchical and clear structure for smooth project progress tracking. Automatic time tracking with the desktop app provides you with accurate timesheets. You can forget manual time tracking and instead, focus on what matters most to your software projects.

All time tracking data is available in detailed reports so you can analyze team performance, which activities take most of the time and where time is lost, which projects are most profitable, and whether work is on track.

‍Real-time dashboards give you valuable insights into project progress, scope creep, and resources. And when you need to check your team's availability, the attendance tracking module provides you with all information on employee absences and leaves so you can distribute work fairly.

What's more, the Google Calendar integration allows you to track time directly for every Google Calendar event.

And if you need to connect your tools, TimeCamp offers 100+ integrations with other apps that allow efficient time management.

TimeCamp is a versatile app that you can fully customize to your needs and use these features that you find helpful.

The free plan is available for teams of all sizes and needs. But if you need more advanced features, you'll need to sign up for one of the paid plans. Pricing starts at $2.99/mo per user billed annually.

2. WakaTime

‍WakaTime is an interesting time tracking software dedicated strictly toWakaTime is an interesting time tracking software dedicated strictly to developers. It's a cluster of over 80 open-source IDE (integrated development environment) plugins that create one unified tool to give you personalized insights into your work.

WakaTime is an automatic time tracker. With background tracking, you can focus on your work while the tool gathers all the necessary info on how many hours you spend on particular tasks.

This tool allows you to track time and see work hours as well as stats on editors, languages, projects, and more. It supports more than 600 languages.

If you're using it in a team, WakaTime offers leaderboards to compete with other team members, which you can use as a form of gamification. It can also be a good source of information on team performance for every project manager.

‍3. Toggl Track

‍Toggl Track is one of the most popular productivity tools. It's a simple time tracking app offering basic functionalities. Hence, if you want a straightforward solution to track employee hours, it'll be a good choice.

Toggl Track offers basic project management tools with task management. You can choose to organize your time entries in grid or calendar format and track time to them with just one click.

Other useful features that you can find in this time tracking software are exportable reports, integrations, idle time detections, mobile and desktop apps, or time off tracking.

‍4. Insightful

‍Insightful is the best time tracking app if you want a tool for workforce productivity analysis. It's best for larger teams who handle multiple projects and need to spot bottlenecks. Insightful offers features that can help improve performance by eliminating time-wasting activities.

This is an employee time tracking software dedicated to work monitoring. So, if you want to analyze the work patterns of your team deeply, it'll be the right fit. Insightful provides time tracking with attendance, app and website usage tracking with screen monitoring, statistics and analytics, and more.

This timesheet app can help in better project planning by defining tasks, allocating resources efficiently, and tracking the time spent on each activity, ensuring projects stay on schedule and within budget.

‍5. nTask

‍nTask is another good time tracking software for software houses. It's a project management and team collaboration software designed to help teams and organizations streamline their workflow, improve productivity, and stay organized. It offers a range of features suitable for both small and large teams.

In nTaks, you can manage projects with tasks, and to-do lists, and prioritize, track, and schedule workload. With issue management options, you can track and manage bugs and issues.

Communication features allow you to create a plan for meetings with discussion points and key meeting minutes so you can decide with accurate follow-up actions.

And automatic time tracking provides online timesheets with all the basic data on work hours.

‍6. Taiga

‍Taiga is a perfect choice for agile teams. It assists in organizing, planning, and tracking tasks for complex projects while providing flexible features that enable seamless team collaboration.

This tool allows you to break down tasks and plan projects with ease. It’s a straightforward solution for teams seeking a user-friendly app. Its scrum functionality helps divide product backlogs into manageable, actionable pieces and prioritize tasks within short time frames.

Among the core features, you'll find agile planning with task prioritization and deliverables, adaptable workflows, Kanban module, Scrum module, issues and bug tracking, and integrations. Taiga is a fully customizable app that you can adjust to your needs.

While it's not a typical time tracking solution, it offers monitoring deadlines, project progress, and managing scope creep to always stay on top.

‍7. Hubstaff

‍Hubstaff is another popular time tracking software for teams of all sizes and types. It's a productivity tool offering timesheet management and performance analytics.

Hubstaff offers automated time tracking (also GPS tracking if you need one), particularly for distributed and hybrid teams. It allows project managers to oversee projects from one platform and make sure all employees are on the same page.

Hubstaff helps to understand people how they spend their time with productivity metrics and automates team operations by eliminating admin work so your team doesn't have to perform all the time-consuming tasks. It also helps to track expenses, manage employee attendance, and handle the financial aspects of projects.

‍Time tracking software for software houses: boosting productivity and efficiency

‍The right time tracking solution can help you create the best team of software developers. With better performance and proper workload distribution, This will make you more productive, accountable, and profitable. So don't wait, choose your favorite tool and start tracking time today.