What is timesheet software?

Timesheet software is a tool for recording how many hours people work and what they work on. Instead of filling in a paper form or a spreadsheet at the end of the week, you start a timer on a task or log hours as you go, and the software adds everything up by day, project, client and person.

It’s used by freelancers who bill by the hour, agencies that need to know which clients are profitable, and small teams that want a fair, simple record of working time.

Why timesheet software matters for a small business

A timesheet answers a simple question: where did the hours go? For a small business, the answer affects money directly.

• Accurate billing. If you charge by the hour, every untracked hour is lost income. A proper record of billable hours also makes your invoices easy to defend.
• Honest project costs. Knowing a website took 80 hours rather than the 50 you quoted tells you what to charge next time.
• Fair workloads. Team hours show who is stretched and who has room before someone burns out.
• Records you may need. Employers often need to show working time. In the UK, for example, Acas explains that employers must keep records showing they follow working time limits, and keep them for two years. Rules differ by country, so check locally. This is general information, not legal advice.

How timesheet software works

Most tools offer two ways to record time:

1. A timer. Pick the task, press start, press stop when you’re done. The software records the exact duration.
2. Manual entry. Type in the time (say 1 hour 30 minutes), the date, the task and a short note. Useful when you forgot to start the timer or worked away from your desk.

Each entry is tied to a task or project and marked billable or not. The software then builds a weekly timesheet: a grid of tasks down the side, days across the top, with totals for each day and the week.

An example

Amara runs a three-person content agency. Each writer starts a timer when they begin a client article and marks it billable. At the end of the week Amara sees 96 hours logged across the team, 71 of them billable, with one client’s blog project taking twice the hours of any other. That tells her to either raise that client’s price or tighten the brief.

Key features of timesheet software

Timesheets vs attendance tracking

The two are easy to confuse. Attendance tracking records when someone clocked in and out, or whether they were in the office, remote or on leave. Timesheets record what they worked on. Being present for eight hours is not the same as eight hours on client work, which is why many businesses use both.

Best practices and common mistakes

1. Track as you go. Filling in a week from memory on Friday is the most common reason timesheets are wrong.
2. Keep it light. If logging time takes more than a few seconds, people stop doing it.
3. Explain why. Tell your team the goal is better pricing and fairer workloads, not watching them. Timesheets used to blame people rarely stay accurate.
4. Add short notes. “Client call about homepage changes” is far more useful than a bare number.
5. Review weekly. A quick look at the team total catches missing entries while people still remember.
6. Use the data. Compare hours with quotes after each project and adjust your prices.

Not ready for software yet? Our free timesheet template is a simple way to start. If you’re comparing tools, read our post on what to look for in timesheet software.

Related terms

• Billable hours: the hours you can charge a client for. See what billable hours are.
• Utilisation rate: billable hours as a share of total hours worked.
• Project management software: where tasks and projects live, which timesheets attach to. See what project management software is.
• Attendance tracking: recording presence, clock-in and leave, rather than work done.

Timesheets in startbuddi

In startbuddi, time tracking sits inside Work, right next to your tasks and projects. On the Time page you pick a task and press Start timer, or use Log time to enter hours, a date, a note and a Billable tick. The week view shows total hours, billable hours and billable value, with a grid of hours by task and day, and you can step back or forward a week.

Managers, admins and owners can switch to Team time to see everyone’s hours. Each project’s Budget tab turns logged time into time spent so far. If you also need clock-in and attendance, the People module has leave and attendance tools that link to Work timesheets.

Find out more on the time tracking page.

Next step: ask everyone on your team to track one normal week with a timer, then sit down together and compare the hours with what each project was quoted.