You’re at the end of the month trying to figure out how many hours you worked on which project. You scroll through your calendar, dig through old notes, and try to remember when exactly you started that job. Sound familiar? Many freelancers and teams struggle with time tracking. Toggl Track promises to put an end to that with simple timers and clear reports. But does it live up to that promise?
I dove into the tool, tested all the features, and gathered experiences from real users. This is what you need to know before you start.
Toggl Track: the company
Toggl Track comes from Estonia and has been around since 2006. The company started as a simple time tracking tool and grew into a complete ecosystem with multiple products. In addition to Toggl Track, they also have Toggl Plan (project planning) and Toggl Hire (recruitment). But the time tracking tool remains their best-known product.
The team behind Toggl works completely remote, spread across different countries. You can see that approach reflected in the product: everything is built for teams that aren’t in the same location. The focus is on simplicity and speed, without unnecessary complexity.
Toggl Track is used by millions of people worldwide, from sole proprietors to large companies. The tool has built a strong reputation in the freelance and remote work community.
Who is Toggl Track for?
Toggl Track is built for anyone who needs to track time. But some groups benefit more than others.
Freelancers who bill by the hour are the ideal users. You start a timer when you begin working for a client, stop it when you pause, and at the end of the month you export everything to an invoice. Simple and effective.
Small teams of up to five people can also work perfectly well with the free plan. You can see at a glance who’s working on which project and how many hours have been logged. That makes planning and capacity management a lot easier.
Agencies and consultancy firms use Toggl Track to separate billable hours from internal time. You can set different rates per project or client and see exactly where you’re making a profit and where you’re not.
People who want to improve their own productivity also find value in the tool. By tracking where your time goes, you gain insight into your work patterns. Maybe you’ll discover that meetings consume much more time than you thought, or that you’re more productive in the morning than in the afternoon.
Where Toggl Track is less suitable: large enterprises with complex approval processes, companies that want to link payroll directly to time tracking, or organizations that need GPS tracking for field employees.
What can Toggl Track do?
Toggl Track is packed with features that make time tracking easier. These are the most important ones:
- One-click timers – Click start and the timer runs. No complicated forms or required fields. You can add which project the time belongs to afterwards. This works on all platforms: web, desktop and mobile.
- Pomodoro timer – Do you like working in 25-minute blocks? The built-in Pomodoro feature automatically reminds you to take breaks. You can adjust the intervals to your own rhythm.
- Idle detection – If you forget to stop the timer, Toggl detects that your computer is idle. You’ll get a notification and can choose whether you want to keep or delete that time. Saves a lot of cleanup work afterwards.
- Billable rates – Set your hourly rate per project or per task. Toggl automatically calculates how much you can bill. You can immediately see the difference between billable and non-billable time.
- Project budgeting and estimates – Indicate how many hours a project is allowed to cost. Toggl warns you if you’re about to go over budget. Useful for monitoring profit margins.
- Detailed reports – Export your hours to PDF, CSV or Excel. Filter by date, project, client or team member. The reports are visual with charts and clear tables. Perfect for invoices or internal analyses.
- Calendar integration – Connect your Google Calendar or Outlook and see your appointments next to your time tracking. You can even automatically start timers based on calendar events.
- Team dashboard – See in real-time who is working on what. As a team leader, you get insight into your team’s capacity without having to ask everyone what they’re doing.
- Browser extensions – Start timers directly from tools like Asana, Trello, Jira or GitHub. You don’t have to constantly switch to Toggl. The extension integrates seamlessly into your workflow.
- Offline functionality – No internet? No problem. The desktop and mobile apps work offline and synchronize everything once you’re back online.
- Tags and labels – Organize your time with tags. For example: “meeting”, “development”, “research”. Later you can filter and analyze where your time goes.
- Reminders – Do you often forget to start the timer? Set reminders that alert you at fixed times or when idle.
The power of Toggl lies in the combination of simplicity and depth. The basics are super simple, but if you need more, the advanced features are there too.
What does Toggl Track cost?
Toggl Track has three pricing tiers: Free, Starter, and Premium.
The Free plan is completely free and always will be. You can track unlimited time with up to five users. You have access to basic reports and can export your data. What you’re missing: billable rates, project budgeting, and advanced reports. For many freelancers and small teams, this is enough.
The Starter plan costs € 9 per user per month with annual billing, or € 10 per month if you pay monthly. This gives you billable rates, project budgeting, required fields, and more reporting options. This plan becomes interesting as soon as you start seriously billing based on your tracked time.
The Premium plan costs € 18 per user per month with annual billing, or € 20 per month billed monthly. This adds: estimated time versus actual time, profit calculations, time audits, and priority support. For larger teams or agencies that want to closely monitor their margins.
All paid plans come with a 30-day trial period. You can test without a credit card and only pay when you’re convinced.
Compared to competitors, Toggl is in the mid-range in terms of price. Not the cheapest, but not extremely expensive either. The question is whether you really need the paid features. Many users stay on the free plan for years.
What should you watch out for?
Toggl Track is solid, but not perfect. There are a few things that frustrate users.
The biggest problem: synchronization issues. Some users report that time they track on their phone doesn’t always immediately appear on desktop, or vice versa. Usually this resolves itself within a few minutes, but if you need to quickly switch between devices it can be annoying. Especially with poor internet connections, you see this more often.
The price of paid plans is a common complaint. € 18 per user per month adds up quickly as your team grows. For a team of ten people, you pay € 180 per month, or € 2160 per year. That’s a serious investment for a time tracking tool. Some competitors offer comparable functionality for less money.
Toggl has no built-in invoicing. You can export your hours and calculate billable amounts, but you still have to create an invoice yourself in another tool. For those looking for an all-in-one solution, that’s a miss. Harvest, for example, does have native invoicing functionality.
The mobile app is good, but not as powerful as the desktop version. Some reports are only available on web, and editing old entries is a bit more cumbersome on mobile. If you work a lot on the go, you’ll run into these limitations.
Customer service gets mixed reviews. Some users are super satisfied, others complain about slow response times. On the free plan, you only have access to email support, which can sometimes take days. Premium users get priority, but even there you sometimes hear about long wait times.
Recent updates have caused bugs and instability for some users. Timers that won’t stop, data that disappears, or the app crashing. This doesn’t happen to everyone, but if you experience it, it’s annoying. The team usually fixes this quickly, but it shows that the software isn’t always stable.
Finally, Toggl is missing a few features that some users expect: no GPS tracking for field service, no payroll integration, and no approval workflows for time tracking. If you need those, you’ll have to look elsewhere.
What do others think?
I looked at reviews from real users and YouTube reviews to get a complete picture.
Most users are positive about the interface. Toggl feels modern and clean. You immediately understand how it works without a manual. That simplicity is exactly what many people choose it for.
The browser extensions receive a lot of praise. You can start a timer directly from your project management tool. That saves a lot of context-switching and makes time tracking much more natural.
The free plan is highly valued. In a world where everything costs money, it’s nice that you can seriously use Toggl without paying. Many freelancers start for free and only upgrade when their business grows.
The reports are described as comprehensive and flexible. You can extract exactly the data you need, in the format you want. For people who need to account for or analyze their time, that’s crucial.
But there is also criticism. George Vlasyev made a YouTube review in which he is positive about the invoicing capabilities, but finds it pricey for teams. He notes that costs add up quickly as you add more users.
Savage Reviews is more critical. In their video they point out missing features like GPS tracking and payroll integration. They find the price not proportional to what you get, especially compared to alternatives.
Asim Qureshi appreciates the browser extension in his review, but complains about slow loading times and bugs. He finds the price too high for what you get in return.
On review sites you see a pattern: people who use the free plan are generally satisfied. People who pay expect more and are more critical about the price-quality ratio.
The synchronization problems come up regularly in reviews. It’s clearly a pain point that Toggl needs to resolve to keep users satisfied.
Toggl Track alternatives
Doesn’t Toggl Track quite fit what you’re looking for? These are the best alternatives:
- Clockify – Has a similar interface to Toggl but allows unlimited users in the free plan. Choose Clockify if you’re looking for a completely free solution for a larger team without user limits. The paid plan is also cheaper than Toggl, but the interface feels slightly less polished.
- Harvest – Focuses more strongly on the financial aspect with built-in invoicing and expense management. Choose Harvest if you want to directly link time tracking to comprehensive invoicing and expense claims. You can send invoices from the tool itself, something Toggl cannot do.
- Timely – Uses AI to automatically track time based on your activity, while Toggl is more manual. Choose Timely if you want to eliminate manually starting and stopping timers through automation. The tool looks at which apps and documents you use and automatically tracks time.
Each alternative has its own strengths. Clockify wins on price, Harvest on invoicing capabilities, and Timely on automation. It depends on what’s most important to you.
Frequently asked questions
Is Toggl Track really free?
Yes, the Free plan is completely free for teams up to five users and includes unlimited time tracking, projects and report exports. There’s no time limit, you can keep using it for free forever. You will miss advanced features like billable rates and project budgeting, but for basic use it’s more than enough.
Does Toggl Track work offline?
Yes, the desktop and mobile apps store your data locally and synchronize everything as soon as you’re connected to the internet again. You can simply start and stop timers without an internet connection. Convenient when you’re on the go or working in places with poor wifi.
Can I send invoices from Toggl Track?
No, Toggl Track itself doesn’t send invoices, but you can export data or integrate with accounting software like Xero or QuickBooks. You can see how much you can invoice based on your tracked hours and rates, but actually creating and sending invoices must be done in another tool. For some users that’s a dealbreaker, for others it’s no problem because they already use accounting software anyway.
Conclusion
Toggl Track does what it promises: make time tracking simple. The interface is clean, the functionality is solid, and the free plan is generous enough for many users.
For freelancers who want to track their hours and small teams who want insight into their time, Toggl is an excellent choice. You’re up and running within five minutes and the learning curve is virtually zero.
But Toggl is not perfect. The synchronization problems are annoying, the price of paid plans is on the high side, and the lack of native invoicing is a shortcoming. If you’re looking for an all-in-one solution or have a very large team, there are better options.
My advice: start with the free plan. Test whether Toggl fits your workflow. Only upgrade if you really need the extra features. And compare with alternatives like Clockify or Harvest before you sign up for a paid subscription.
Toggl Track is a solid time tracking tool that works well for many people. It’s not a miracle solution, but if you’re looking for something that just works without hassle, you’re in the right place.