Time attendance apps allow you to easily track exact employee work hours and time off so that you can confidently pay your staff accurately – so no more buddy punching, time theft, or costly timesheet errors. Check out my top picks of attendance apps and find the one that best suits you and your business.
Without the right tools, tracking your employee’s work hours can be a complete hassle, to say the least. From endless piles of paperwork to tracking down employees to record their hours, it’s not an easy task.
Fortunately, time attendance apps allow you to automate and precisely track your team’s time so you pay them exactly what they deserve.
I’ve done extensive research of time and attendance apps on the market and lined up my top 8 picks to help you find the one that best fits your company’s needs and budget. Let’s take a look!
If you don’t have the time to read through our research, jump down to our quick comparison table.
Our Top Picks
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Best all-in-one time and attendance app for the deskless workforce.
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Good for monitoring team performance in terms of key metrics.
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Good for automated payments.
How I Chose the Best Time and Attendance Apps
To give you a more specific look into how I narrowed down my list, these are the key functions and features I looked for when reviewing time and attendance apps:
Important core features
- Scheduler: The app should come with an easy-to-use scheduler to create employee schedules, and the time clock should integrate with it directly.
- Mobile time clock: The software should allow your employees to clock in and out of their shifts from their phones.
- Geofencing: This feature ensures that employees are marking attendance from the correct location, especially useful for remote or field workers.
- Absences management: The best time and attendance apps track employee absences automatically.
I looked for usability features, including:
- Ease of use: The time attendance app is easy to set up and offers an intuitive user experience.
- Customizability: The app should suit your team structures and shift types.
- Quick login: Employees need to be able to log in quickly and easily clock in and out from their work sites.
- Price: It should be cost-friendly and suits your budget.
- Support:Good customer support is key to help you with any product issues.
I also checked for other key product features, like:
- Automated alerts and reminders: Automated alerts are crucial to keep teams up to date. For instance, the app should notify managers when an employee works overtime and should alert employees when a leave request is approved or rejected.
- Customizable reporting: The app should offer customizable reports on attendance trends, absenteeism, late arrivals, and other relevant metrics.
- Payroll management: It’s important for time and attendance apps to allow you to export data for payroll or integrate with payroll software.
The 7 Best Time and Attendance Apps of 2023
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Connecteam — All-in-one time and attendance app for the deskless workforce
Connecteam is the best online time and attendance app that lets you track your employees’ work hours and manage timesheets accurately with complete ease and efficiency from anywhere.
Why I chose Connecteam: Connecteam offers a single-touch time clock, GPS tracking, job-specific time tracking options, automated timesheets, absence and time off management, streamlined payroll processing, and more.
In addition, the app has exceptional customer service, a user-friendly interface, additional employee management features, and a highly customizable platform that can be adjusted to suit your unique business needs.
To better understand Connecteam’s time and attendance tracking capabilities, we’ve detailed how you can use these to enhance your workforce management below.
GPS time clock and geofencing tools for better oversight
Connecteam’s GPS-enabled time clock lets employees clock in and out directly from their mobile phones. Employers can also set up a kiosk station on a single device if employees work in the same location.
GPS tracking
Connecteam offers several GPS tracking features to ensure your team is exactly where they should be while clocked in.
With your preferred settings, you can choose to log your employees’ exact location when they clock in and out or track their real-time location throughout their workday. It is also possible to set up a digital geofence around your workplaces is also possible to limit the area from which your staff can clock in and out.
This allows you to prevent employees from clocking in before starting their shifts and eliminate potential time theft.
Job-specific time tracking options
As an admin, you can decide what to track time for. For instance, you can record work hours spent on specific jobs, locations, or clients.
You can use different viewing options from your admin dashboard and see exactly how much time is spent on a specific project or client. This way, you can further gain valuable insights into how you’re allocating your resources. This data is also particularly useful for billing and invoicing purposes.
Automated timesheets
The app automatically logs all tracked time on a digital timesheet. From here, you can view and review all recorded data, such as total hours worked per day and during a set payroll period, overtime, time off, and breaks. The app also makes it easy to spot and correct potentially costly payroll mistakes by highlighting discrepancies.
You can also set up pay rates for each one of your employees or jobs and calculate work hours, breaks, and overtime automatically.
Through the same app on their mobile phones, your staff can review their personal timesheets, request any edits, and submit their approval before you process payroll.
Absence & time off management
With the time off feature, you can set up your company’s time off policies for any type of absence – paid or unpaid – and manage employee time off requests submitted through the app accordingly.
The app will then automatically calculate and process the absence based on your predefined policies, notify the relevant employee of the status of their request, and keep a record of the process. This spares you unnecessary back-and-forth, manual calculations, or scattered processes.
Intuitive drag-and-drop shift scheduler
Connecteam offers an intuitive drag-and-drop employee scheduling tool so you can create shifts and simply drag employees’ names to them. With the shift scheduler, you can automatically assign shifts based on employee qualifications, preferences, and availability.
You can also take advantage of scheduling templates to make the process even faster. Use Connecteam’s premade scheduling templates or customize your own however you need. You can also create and automatically assign recurring shifts.
Additionally, Connecteam has automatic shift conflict alerts that let you know immediately of any scheduling errors. This helps you reduce labor costs by avoiding double scheduling, assigning the wrong employee to a shift, or assigning an employee who’s scheduled for PTO.
Add tasks, forms, checklists, and descriptions to shifts
One of the best things about Connecteam is it allows you to ensure all your employees have all the information they need to do their jobs properly. Include shift-specific tasks, forms, checklists, and descriptions that employees see as soon as they clock in for their shifts.
That way, employees understand exactly what’s expected of them you can check in with their progress throughout their workdays.
Streamlined payroll processing
When ready for payroll, you can directly export employee timesheets to your preferred payroll software or use one of Connecteam’s payroll integrations: QuickBooks and Gusto. This way, you can skip the whole manual process and save valuable time and effort.
Connecteam is the best employee time attendance app for both large organizations and small business owners with frontline and non-desk employees. Connecteam serves more than 90 industries, including construction, healthcare, F&B, cleaning, field service, and retail.
I had people that we would just schedule for work and hope and pray that they show up. And now, we have an average of a 90-95% attendance rate.
Key Features
Pros
Intuitive and easy to use
All-in-one solution
Great customer support
Budget-friendly
Cons
More integrations in development
Pricing
Free-for-life plan availablePremium plans start at $29/month for 30 users
The Best Attendance App For Your Business
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Timely — Best for monitoring team performance and measuring key metrics
Available on
- Web
- iOS
- Android
Timely is an AI-powered time tracking app that allows you to track your team’s time and performance on a single dashboard.
Why I chose Timely: Timely automatically works in the background to record the time employees spend in different work apps so you can be sure to pay employees accurately. This also removes manual error from company reporting and ensures that your company bills corrects for all of the work you do.
This time and attendance app also ensures user privacy. As Timely puts it, the app is “100% creep-proof” and doesn’t engage in keystroke monitoring or take any unauthorized screenshots.
With KPI tracking, you can monitor team performance in terms of key metrics such as capacity. Create a customizable tagging system to know how time is spent. Easily spot missing hours and notify whoever needs to log their hours.
I also like how many integrations Timely has. This time and attendance app integrates seamlessly with many solutions like Asana, Toggl, Freshservice, Todoist, Trello, and Wrike.
Learn more about TimelyKey Features
- Overtime documentation
- Timesheet sharing
- Payroll
- Performance reviews
- Invoicing
Pros
- Desktop and mobile access
- Good customer service
Cons
- Text and SMS not included in pricing
- App is only available in English
Pricing
Starts at $16/user/month, for 6-50 users Trial: Yes Free Plan: No
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Hubstaff — Best for automated payments
Available on
- Web
- iOS
- Android
- Windows
- Mac
Hubstaff prides itself on providing accurate time tracking by using real-time GPS location.
Why I chose Hubstaff: I really like how easy Hubstaff is to set up and use. payroll, invoicing, and more. If an employee loses service, the hours are tracked offline and will sync back up once a connection is restored.
When an employee tracks time, that time is added directly to an invoice and to their employee timesheet. This reduces the time you need to run payroll or manually check everyone’s working hours.
The app allows your team to clock in and out quickly from job job sites right from their phones. You and all your managers can also create time reports with an abundance of data the app provides that will allow them to learn more about how employees spend their working time. You can then use this information to generate better estimates, streamline your workflow, and complete projects on time.
Learn more about HubstaffKey Features
- Detailed reports
- Online timesheets
- Geofencing
- Expense tracking
Pros
- Productivity management
- Good reporting feature
Cons
- Limited payroll options
- Productivity tracker has some bugs
Pricing
Starts at $4.99/user/month, 2 users minimum Trial: Yes — 14-day Free Plan: Yes — For one user only
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Harvest — Best for flexible time tracking
Available on
- Web
- iOS
- Android
Harvest offers start and stop timers so you can work as needed and all hours are entered into a timesheet at once.
Why I chose Harvest: With Harvest, time tracking is suited to your needs and preferences. Tracking time for specific clients, projects, and tasks is also easy. Additionally, you can add notes to the time clock for specific shifts. Harvest integrates with some excellent productivity software like Trello, Zendesk, Slack, Asana, Xero.
Learn more about HarvestKey Features
- Track expenses
- Track billable hours
- Timesheet approval
- Automatic reminders
Pros
- Easy invoicing capabilities
- Easy to use
Cons
- Not many customizable features
- Interface looks dated
Pricing
$10.8/user/month Trial: Yes — 30-day Free Plan: Yes — Up to 1 seat & 2 projects
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QuickBooks Time — Best for businesses that already use Quickbooks for payroll
Available on
- Web
- iOS
- Android
- Windows
- Mac
QuickBooks Time is a popular time and attendance app to track hours, projects, or even labor estimates.
Why I chose Quickbooks Time: The app makes it easy to track hours, conduct payroll reports, and view detailed timesheets. Additionally, QuickBooks integrates with solutions like Xero, Square, Dropbox, and Salesforce.
Learn more about QuickBooks TimeKey Features
- GPS time stamps
- Geofencing capabilities
- View employee locations with “Who’s Working”
- Alerts and approvals
Pros
- Detailed reporting
- User friendly
Cons
- Poor customer service
- Advanced features can be difficult to use
Pricing
Starts at $20/month + $10/user/month Trial: Yes — 30-day Free Plan: No
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Avaza — Best for tracking both billable and non-billable hours
Available on
- Web
- iOS
- Android
Avaza is a versatile project management and business automation platform designed to streamline work processes.
Why I chose Avaza: Its main features include task tracking, integrated time tracking, expense management, and invoicing capabilities, all within a single unified interface. Among its best tools are its visual project timelines (Gantt charts), automated recurring invoicing, and a robust reporting system that provides insights into project budgets, team productivity, and other critical metrics.
Learn more about AvazaKey Features
- Set billable and nonbillable hours
- Assign cost rates per project
- Timesheet approvals
- Expense tracking
Pros
- Easy invoicing
- Integrated project management
Cons
- Difficult to edit multiple projects
- No contract feature
Pricing
Starts at $11.95/month + $7/user/month for more than 2 users Trial: No Free Plan: Yes — For a single user
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Toggl — Best for businesses that need reporting tools
Available on
- Web
- iOS
- Android
Learn more about TogglToggl is a widely-used time and attendance app designed to help teams and individuals monitor their work hours.
Why I chose Toggl: Its main features include a mobile time clock for time tracking, detailed reporting, and the ability to categorize time entries by project, client, or tag. Its intuitive user interface, seamless integrations with a variety of other productivity apps, and powerful dashboard provide a quick overview of time allocation and project progress.
Key Features
- Estimates and team planning
- Budget projections
- Automated timesheets
- Over 100+ integrations
Pros
- Lock old reports to keep your data accurate
- Clean up reports with time audits
Cons
- The mobile app is difficult to use
- Unable to pause time clock
Pricing
Starts at $10/user/month Trial: Yes Free Plan: Yes
Compare the Best Time and Attendance Apps
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Start for free
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| Reviews |
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| Pricing |
Starts at just $29/month for the first 30 users
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Starts at $16/user/month, for 6-50 users
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Starts at $4.99/user/month, 2 users minimum
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$10.8/user/month
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Starts at $20/month + $10/user/month
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Starts at $11.95/month + $7/user/month for more than 2 users
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Starts at $10/user/month
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| Free Trial |
yes
14-day
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yes
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yes
14-day
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yes
30-day
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yes
30-day
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no
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yes
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| Free Plan |
yes
Free Up to 10 users
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no
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yes
For one user only
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yes
Up to 1 seat & 2 projects
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no
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yes
For a single user
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yes
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What is a Time and Attendance App?
A time and attendance app is software that is used to keep track of employee hours. It helps organizations better manage the time their employees are spending at work, ensuring accuracy and efficiency in the payroll process.
These apps allow for flexible time tracking, enabling employers to make sure employees are clocking in and out properly, as well as reporting any overtime or tardiness.
Managers can also quickly see who is where in the organization at any given moment. With its cloud-based technology, it offers employers greater visibility into employee activity and easier financial management.
Most attendance tracking apps allow businesses to:
- Digitally and accurately track employee hours and attendance
- Ensure employees are clocked in at the right location with a GPS timestamp
- Manage overtime and time limitations with alerts and notifications
- Quickly run payroll
- Manage employee absence and PTO requests
How Does a Time and Attendance App Work?
Time and attendance apps utilize a variety of technologies to accurately track employee hours. This includes using a digital clock-in system or biometric scanning. Employees will log in with a unique ID, such as their name or badge number, then clock out upon leaving work.
The software then automatically compiles the data into an easy-to-read report that managers and business owners can use for payroll purposes. Additionally, some time and attendance apps offer additional features such as scheduling capabilities, shift tracking, geo-fencing and even GPS tracking.
In addition to tracking employee hours, many applications allow for easier communication between employees and employers by offering automated notifications when shifts are changed or canceled. This can help reduce confusion and ensure employees are notified when necessary.
Time and attendance apps also usually come with comprehensive reporting tools that enable employers to gain insight into productivity levels, absenteeism trends, labor costs analysis and more.
What Are the Benefits of a Time and Attendance App?
Reduces manual errors
Reducing manual errors saves your company time and money. With time tracking and attendance software, you can send accurate invoices to clients. In addition, with accurate and exact payroll, you increase employee satisfaction and productivity.
Ensures regulatory compliance
The Fair Labor Standards Act requires businesses to keep accurate records and an automated time tracking and attendance app allows businesses to easily and efficiently keep track of all data. Gone are the days of lost or misplaced paperwork; now everything can be stored on an app.
Provides oversight of employee working hours
A time attendance app provides complete oversight of their employees’ hours. In addition to time tracking, managers can track projects and manage reporting. With real-time data, business owners can make better, more informed decisions.
Eliminates buddy-punching and time theft
With a time attendance app, you can easily curb overtime with automatic notifications and reminders. In addition, employees can no longer clock in for their friends. If the time attendance app you choose has geofencing capabilities, then employees can’t even clock into their job unless they’re in the designated location.
FAQs
Is it possible to cheat an attendance app?
While we’d like to think the answer is no, it is possible. Some time and attendance apps that do not have a GPS location stamp or geofencing capabilities allow employees to have the ability to clock in before they have actually reached the job.
If you are concerned about time theft and want to reduce these costs, it would be beneficial to sign up for a time attendance app that has these features, even if it may be an additional cost. For example, Connecteam has geofencing, so employees can’t clock in before reaching their job sites.
How much should an attendance app cost?
While this question depends on what other features you may be looking for in a time attendance app, the short answer is anywhere between free and $20. With Connecteam, you can sign up for the free plan and easily track up to 50 employee attendances!
Remember, one of the benefits of attendance apps is that they help you save money, so even the very best attendance app should be affordable!
Why should I invest in an attendance app?
The benefits of accurately tracking your employees’ hours are endless. A time attendance app is the best solution for reducing costs from manual errors to increasing employee productivity and satisfaction. What business owner wouldn’t want clear and complete oversight of their employee hours, attendance, and payroll? Lastly, making sure your business is in compliance with all laws and regulations regarding overtime is made extremely easy with a time tracking and attendance app.
The Bottom Line on Time and Attendance Software
Regardless of industry type and company size, there are countless benefits of using time and attendance software.
Review the options above and test out the products with a free trial. When you find an option that works best for your business, stick with it. It’ll be the best business decision you’ll make!