7 Best RescueTime Alternatives 2021 [Review, Pricing]

Looking for the best RescueTime alternative?

While RescueTime is a user-friendly time tracker, it isn’t perfect. It’s not great for task tracking, and doesn’t have any payroll features or many integrations.

That’s why we’ve compiled this list of powerful RescueTime alternatives to help you track time and boost productivity in no time!

Here are the tools we’ll be covering:

(You can use the links below to jump to a specific tool)

The 7 Best RescueTime Alternatives

(includes features, pros, cons, pricing, and customer ratings)

• • Time Doctor
  • Tick
  • TimeCamp
  • Toggl
  • ActivTrack
  • EverHour
  • Staff.com

Let’s get started.

The 7 Best RescueTime Alternatives

Here are 7 best RescueTime alternatives to help you track time and boost productivity immediately:

1. Time Doctor

Time Doctor is a powerful time tracking and performance monitoring tool that’ll help you boost productivity immediately. Used by companies like Apple, Ericsson, and KPMG, it has everything you need from a time tracking software.

Here’s a closer look at some of its key features:

A) User-Friendly Time Tracking

Unlike other monitoring tools, Time Doctor is very easy to use.

All you need to do is

• Open the app.
• Type in the name of your task.
• Start the timer (where the app runs quietly in the background).
• Pause the timer when you’re done.

It’s that simple!

B) Effective Distraction Management

Worried that your team is distracted on the job?

With Time Doctor’s distraction management features, that won’t be an issue.

Whenever someone accesses an unproductive site like Facebook or YouTube, Time Doctor displays a pop-up asking them if they’re still working. This nudge is usually good enough to get them back to work!

For added customization, you can also classify sites and apps productive or unproductive.

C) Powerful Reporting

Time Doctor has tons of detailed reports to help you monitor your team members in real-time. Here’s a closer look at them

• • Timesheet Report: The total hours worked by your team over a time period.

• Time Use Report: The time spent on all tasks by a single employee over a time period.
• Projects Report: Helps you know who worked on which projects and for how long.
• Web And App Usage Report: Lists the apps and sites accessed by each employee during work hours, and the time they spent on each of them.
• Timeline Daily Report: Chronological breakdown of time spent on work by an employee in a day.
• Poor-time Use: Highlights the unproductive sites and apps accessed by an employee along with when they accessed it and how long they spent there.

D) Inactivity Monitoring

Want to ensure that your team is actively working during work hours?

Time Doctor will automatically pause the timer when there’s been no keyboard or mouse activity for three minutes. This way, employees can’t mark idle time as hours worked.

Note: Time Doctor doesn’t track which keys were pressed – it only determines if any keys were pressed or not.

E) Client login
Keeping your clients updated about their projects has never been easier!

With Time Doctor’s client login feature, your clients can access timesheets, reports, and other data relating to their projects.

Note: For privacy reasons, clients can only view data about their own projects.

F) Payroll

Unlike RescueTime, TimeDoctor has built-in payroll management features. With integrations with PayPal, Payoneer, and TransferWise, you can quickly pay employees and freelancers for their work!

G) Integrations

Need to track your team’s productivity across different apps?

No problem!

Time Doctor can integrate with tons of different tools like Slack, Freshbooks, and Google Apps to help you easily monitor your employee’s work activities on different platforms!

Click here for a comprehensive list of TimeDoctor integrations.

Pros

• Cross-platform availability with support for Windows, Linux and Mac OS.
• Optional screenshot monitoring.
• Powerful, versatile reports that can be exported as PDF, CSV or MS Excel files.
• Supports attendance and time off tracking.
• Supports offline monitoring.
• Strict privacy controls to protect employees’ privacy.
• Powerful iOS and Android apps.

Cons

• More suitable to businesses than freelancers.
• No free version.

Pricing

• Starts at $7 / user per month (comes with a free 14-day trial, no credit card required).

Customer ratings

• Capterra – 4.6/5 (290+ reviews)
• G2 Crowd – 4.3/5 (130+ reviews)

2. Tick

Tick is a time tracker that’s lighter on features than Toggl, but it has one major difference that makes it stand out from the crowd – per project pricing.

This could make it much cheaper than RescueTime (and all other solutions on the list) if you have a very large team working on a very small number of projects. It also supports custom projects and browser-based time management like the open-source software Kimai.

Key Features

• Simple time tracking and timesheet reporting.
• Can set budgets for projects and tasks and track them in real-time.
• Supports time tracking on your phone, watch, tablet, desktop, and browser.
• Strong integrations with apps, including Basecamp, Trello, and QuickBooks.

Pros

• Per project pricing is good for large teams.
• Can set up recurring projects.
• Can run multiple timers at the same time.

Cons

• Tasks need to be set up and timed within each project’s interface.
• No leave and time-off tracking.
• No offline tracking.

Pricing

Here’s Tick’s unique per-project pricing model:

• 1 free project
• 10 projects, $19 / month
• 30 projects, $49 / month
• 60 projects, $79 / month
• Unlimited projects, $149 / month

Customer ratings

• Capterra – 4.5/5 (1,350+ reviews)
• G2 Crowd – 4.3/5 (20+ reviews)

3. TimeCamp

TimeCamp is one of the best alternatives to RescueTime, combining screenshot, website, and application monitoring into one tool that has a great selection of integrations.

Like Hubstaff, it also supports automatic and invisible time tracking when there is no expectation of privacy at all – such as when an employee is using office space and office hardware that is company-owned.

As an alternative to RescueTime, it may suffer in the accuracy department because it doesn’t require time to be tracked live and makes no distinction between manually added time and live tracked time.

Key Features

• Automatic time and attendance tracking.
• Supports screenshot monitoring.
• Can track time via its desktop app for Windows and Mac and its Chrome plugin
• Supports offline monitoring.

Pros

• Powerful integrations with project management tools.
• Powerful mobile and web apps.
• Supports project tracking with real-time notifications.

Cons

• No inactivity monitoring features.
• No client portal.
• Limited online invoicing and expense tracking features.

Pricing

• Solo: Free for one user forever, with time tracking, unlimited projects & tasks, productivity reports, mobile & desktop app
• Basic: $5.25 /user per month, with integrations, reports export, billable time & budgeting
• Pro: $7.50 /user per month, with invoicing, timesheet approvals
• Enterprise: Price on request, for 100+ users

Customer ratings

• Capterra – 4.7/5 (500+ reviews)
• G2 Crowd – 4.6/5 (130+ reviews)

4. Toggl

What Toggl lacks in features, it makes up for in sheer ease of use. Like Harvest, Toggl doesn’t have the Website and Application data provided by RescueTime, and it also isn’t able to differentiate between live tracked time and manually added time.

But Toggl lets you create custom Tasks and Projects, and also allows browser based time tracking – two important features for some use cases. Where Toggl really shines as a RescueTime alternative is in the massive number of integrations they currently support.

Key Features

• Simple task and project time tracking.
• Can track time on your browser, and mobile devices.
• Powerful reporting options.
• Helpful inactivity reminders.
• Supports manual time entries and calendar integrations.

Pros

• UI is easy to use.
• Integrates with plenty of apps.
• Generous free plan for freelancers.

Cons

• No invoicing features.
• Can’t differentiate between live tracked time and manually added time.
• Summary tab only shows time per week (can’t view monthly records).

Pricing

• Free plan for up to 5 users, with basic time tracking
• Starter: $10 /user per month, with time tracking and reporting
• Premium: $10 /user per month, with profitability charts, email scheduling, tracking reminders
• Enterprise: Price on request, with priority support, training, customization

Customer ratings

• Capterra – 4.6/5 (900+ reviews)
• G2 Crowd – 4.4/5 (800+ reviews)

5. ActivTrak

ActivTrak is another affordable option, and one of the very few time tracking apps that can block certain websites like RescueTime does. But be aware, if you hope to block your employees from accessing certain websites, it’s a feature that’s easy to circumvent.

ActivTrak is missing custom tasks & projects, and real-time vs. manual time differentiation. It can be run invisibly and can also capture screenshots, which gives it an edge, as long as you don’t need any mobile apps or integrations.

Key Features

• Employee monitoring with screenshots and video playback.
• Built-in distraction management features.
• Insider threat detection and risk scoring.
• Can classify websites as productive or non-productive.
• Support for web, mobile, and desktop time tracking.

Pros

• Simple setup.
• User privacy features like screenshot redaction and scheduled monitoring.
• Powerful dashboard and reports.

Cons

• Cannot set custom tasks and projects.
• No inactivity monitoring capabilities.
• Cannot blur screenshots.
• No mobile apps.

Pricing

• Free for up to 3 users / forever with 3GB storage
• Advanced: $7.20 /user per month, with video playback, screenshot flagging and screenshot redaction

Customer ratings

• Capterra – 4.6/5 (450+ reviews)
• G2 Crowd – 4.4/5 (100+ reviews)

6. Everhour

With Everhour there is no need to install a desktop application – you track time right from your web browser. It’s better than RescueTime for project management as it lets you create custom Projects and Tasks in advance before starting your time tracking for the day. Everhour is meant to be more team-focused than some other solutions.

Key Features

• Supports manual time tracking.
• Can set and track time estimates.
• Has helpful notifications to track time effectively.
• Powerful browser extension and iOS app.
• Invoicing and multiple billing options.

Pros

• Can group tasks together for easier project tracking.
• Lets you create projects and tasks in advance (before starting to track time).
• Good timesheet management like TSheets.

Cons

• No Android app.
• Cannot set recurring projects.
• No offline monitoring.

Pricing

• Free for up to 5 users, with all the features, except integrations and second-priority support.
• Solo: $8 /month for 1 user with all the features except email/chat support.
• Team: $7 /user /month, for 5+ users with all features, email/chat support, and volume discounts.

Customer ratings

• Capterra – 4.7/5 (200+ reviews)
• G2 Crowd – 4.7/5 (80+ reviews)

7. Staff.com

This time tracking solution is geared more towards tracking productivity in larger office environments than on mobile and remote teams. Staff.com lets you track activity automatically in the background, and has strong accuracy on it’s recorded data.

As a RescueTime alternative, it does currently suffer from no integrations, but that is likely to change thanks to the powerful API it has. Larger organizations will appreciate the longer trial period of 30 days when compared to RescueTime’s 14-day trial.

Key Features

• Can track time on an hourly, daily, weekly, and monthly basis.
• Advanced activity tracking with screenshot monitoring.
• GPS tracking available on the mobile app.
• Can monitor web and app usage.
• Can be hosted on the cloud or via your company’s own servers.
• Tons of insightful reports.

Pros

• Supports inactivity monitoring.
• Adaptable to business needs.
• Powerful API to integrate with task management and other productivity software.

Cons

• No free version.
• Aimed at businesses – not freelancers.

Pricing

• Growing teams: hosted in the cloud, starts at $10 per month, one user.
• Larger teams: hosted in the cloud, price on request, for 50 to 10,000 users.
• On-premise: hosted on your server, price on request, for unlimited users.

Customer ratings

• G2 Crowd – 4/5 (1 review)

Conclusion

All these RescueTime alternatives are good and will help you track time and monitor your employees.

But Time Doctor stands out on many levels. It’s advanced monitoring features, client management capabilities, and detailed time reports will easily help you boost your team’s productivity.

Here is a handy comparative chart summarizing the key feature differences among the top time tracking tools:

 
About The Author:
Rob Rawson is a co-founder of Time Doctor which is software to improve work productivity and help keep track of what your team is working on, even when working remotely.