Written by: Matthew Davis

Introduction

Whether you’re a freelancer, an entrepreneur, or you run a team of people, tracking time is vital to your productivity and accurate billing. Timely, a time tracking app, gives you a convenient and easy way to keep track of your time so you can get on with work, without needing to maintain manual logs.

In this Timely review 2024, pros, cons, pricing and more we will look closer as to what the platform has to offer. By the end, you’ll know whether Timely is the right tool to help you boost productivity and manage your time more effectively.

Pros

✅ AI powered and automatic time tracking

✅ Simple and clean interface, easy for beginners.

✅ Monitor project progress and time allocation in real-time.

✅ Detailed, customizable reports for better time analysis.

✅ Multi currency support

Cons

❌ Pricing may not be ideal for very small teams or freelancers.

❌ Lacks robust offline features, making it dependent on internet connectivity.

❌ Automatic tracking may sometimes log incorrect activities, needing manual adjustments.

❌ Does not integrate with payroll software

Pricing

How does it compare in pricing to its closest competitors

Key Features

Automatic time tracking

Automatic time tracking in Timely will allow you to manage your work hours easily. Rather than manually setting and stopping timers per task, Timely´s memory tracker automatically monitors the time you spend on each activity as it is happening in the background. It ensures that every billable minute is accounted for.

It is an accurate and reliable time tracker that also integrates with calendars, email and project management tools, it syncs with them to pull in your different tasks and schedules and it also fills your time sheets automatically.

With Timelys memory tracker you can edit and or delete time entries with just a few clicks (Source: Timely)

Automatic time tracking will let you record all your work hours automatically without you having to do anything. Timely puts all your scheduled activity together so you know how much time you have devoted to each project or client. Not only does this save you time but also ensure that you do not miss paying for any work done.

In the dashboard you can see what is affecting your project budget. You have an overview over logged hours, project progress and you can also use the filter feature based on team members, projects, time frames, and tags, helping you focus on specific tasks or individuals (Source: Timely)

It is also one of the most intelligent features. Timely remembers what you’ve done over time so you can better organize your activities. You can track your time entry in real-time, and learn what you are able to produce, and then determine how you can improve your time management.

Real-Time Project Tracking

Real-time project management is also one of Timely’s core features. It gives you live visibility into the status of your projects, keeping track of deadlines, budgets, and investment. Projects and tasks can be created and assigned with Timely and you can track the time spent on each aspect of the project. It’s very useful for project managers and team leaders who must ensure things are on track.

In addition, Timely’s project management tool provides you with visual cues that show you the progress of tasks. It lets you see at a glance what projects are progressing and what needs more focus. 

The intuitive dashboard of Timely helps you stay on budget and within the estimated completion time, and you’ll have a clear view of your entire workspace, making project coordination a breeze (Source: Timely)

The dashboard provides you with real time updates and insights, making it easy to keep track of your projects status. The dashboard gives a visual representation of the hours worked versus the budget, making it easy to see if you’re on track or overspending. (Source: Timely)

It’s also seamlessly integrated with the time tracking feature and automatically assigns hours to relevant projects. With customizable reports you can monitor performance, manage resources and anticipate the future needs of projects. 

Timely is therefore an ideal solution for multiple, time-critical projects teams that need visibility into the progress of their tasks. But smaller teams or users with a less demanding workflow will find that part of the feature is unnecessary or complicated.

AI Timesheets

Timely’s AI-powered timesheets automate what is one of the most inconvenient tasks of timekeeping: timesheet creation. Machine learning and memory tracking will automatically compute your timesheet in line with your day’s activities. It recognizes work you have done, keeps track of time and it populates your timesheet for you.

(Source: Timely)

This intelligent strategy eliminates human error and provides 100% accuracy without constant user input. You can take a look at the suggested timesheet, edit it and accept it. The AI also gets more natural with time as it becomes more pertinent and makes even more personalized recommendations based on your work style, slashing the manual time logs hours and stress of managing detailed time reports.

This is particularly great for the uber-productive people who would prefer to have accurate reporting for billing, project management, or productivity tracking without having to manually keep tabs on minutes.

Task Planning

Timely’s task planner helps organize and make it easier to schedule your tasks in a way that can help you prioritize time and stay on track. You can create tasks, deadlines, and assign different tasks to teammates using this feature for more collaboration and accountability.

But what really impressed us with Timely’s task planning is that you can combine it with automatic timekeeping. Timely automatically calculates how much time you spent as you work, without you having to input it manually. This will allow you to be more efficient about doing your work rather than managing it, since the platform helps you to see the way your time is allocated across tasks and projects.

The built-in time tracking feature makes its easy to monitor project progress, plan task, make data driven decisions and keep projects on track and within budget (Source: Timely)

The task planning interface is very intuitive so you can visualize your tasks clearly. You can drag and drop items to assign priority or set deadlines as required. You get this modularity so you can tailor your roadmap to evolving project requirements or your productivity schedule.

(Source: Timely)

Timely also supports recurring tasks so it’s easy to manage recurring tasks without resetting each time. This is very useful for teams who regularly check in or have repetitive processes.

Overall, Timely’s task planner gives you the power to better plan your time and to ensure that you get the most out of your time.

Multi-Platform Support

Timely’s multi-platform support reflects the requirements of modern working professionals on various devices and at various locations. Whether you are at your desk, in a meeting or on the move, you can access Timely on your desktop, tablet or smartphone. This versatility is essential for remote workers and freelancers who shift between different environments during the day.

Using Timely, you can set a timer on your laptop at home and switch it to your smartphone when you have a meeting or working from a coffee shop. So you are never left behind during this seamless change and your time is automatically counted no matter what place you are in.

With cross-platform sync, whatever is changed or added on one device instantly shows up on the others. Such real-time synchronization helps to remove miscommunication and keep the latest data at your fingertips. So, for instance, you set time on your phone while taking a client call and see that time saved on your desktop when you come back to the office.

Moreover, the app on mobile is well designed so it is easy to access while you are on the go. It allows you to access your time sheets, edit the entries, and check project statuses with minimal effort. It’s easy for you to work when you’re away from your main workstation.

Invoices feature

Timely’s invoicing feature can help you streamline the billing process, so you can send out reliable invoices based on tracked time. It integrates with time logging and project management features to help make it super simple to bill customers for the time spent on tasks and projects you work on (no manual entry required). You can charge by the hour for any task or customer, use billable rates from your tracked time, and build professional, detailed invoices.

You also have an ability to see what invoices were sent, paid, or outstanding, which helps you manage your finances. Clients can have automated reminders configured so that you get paid when you need to without manually chasing invoices. One of Timely’s key advantages is its unique feature of setting up different hourly rates for tasks/users automatically, so invoices reflect the true value of the completed work.

The invoicing feature lets you create professional invoices (Source: Timely)

It’s also capable of exporting invoices to many different formats, and it works with accounting software such as QuickBooks, Xero, and FreshBooks. It offers configurable templates and multiple currencies, so invoices are tailored to your branding and clients needs.

When you connect Timely with QuickBooks, your invoice data flows seamlessly between both platforms. This eliminates the need for duplicate entries and the manual effort of updating financial records, saving you time and reducing errors (Source: Timely)

Integrations

Timely offers integrations with many different apps (third party integrations), which makes it useful in multiple tools and platforms. Here is a breakdown of its most useful integrations:

➔ Project Management: It integrates with Asana, Trello and Monday.com to sync work and keep time between projects.

➔ Calendar integration: With Google calendar and Outlook integration, planned events can be synced automatically and tracked without needing to enter them.

➔ Communication Tools: Timely integrates with Slack and Microsoft Teams to allow time reports to be shared in conversations and even measure the time spent on particular conversations.

➔ Accounting and Billing: It integrates with QuickBooks and Xero, which simplifies the invoicing process by ensuring all billable hours are properly accounted for.

➔ Productivity & Development: Zapier, GitHub, Jira are all part of the solution, so technology teams have a faster path to track development work. Zapier also lets you connect Timely to more than 2,000 other apps which greatly extends its versatility.

Timely has many workflows but it doesn’t integrate with payroll solutions, which might be a limitation for businesses who want a single HR or payment system.

Comprehensive Reporting

Timely’s reports are strong and customizable, so you can readily monitor your spending time across projects, clients, and teams. The platform gives you real-time data that will help you take responsible decisions on how you work and how productive you are.

The timesheets can be exported, displaying where individual projects spend time so you can see where resources are being used. For instance, if you have several clients, you’ll be able to see which projects are taking up the most time and whether it is in accordance with what you want. 

Timely’s reporting feature provides detailed insights into how time is spent across projects, teams, and tasks (Source: Timely)

There’s also a customizable report feature in Timely’s reporting tool. You can generate custom reports for specific metrics, such as billable hours, timelines, or team performance. Visualization with graphs and charts gives you an additional insight into the use of time and productivity patterns.

User-Friendly Interface

Timely’s interface is so easy and simple that even someone new to time trackers can get started in the app. The simple design eliminates clutter and distraction so you can concentrate on what you care about — keeping track of your time.

You don’t have to wade through complex menus or settings to get to the essentials. This intuitive structure is a great benefit for teams because everyone can learn within minutes. Onboarding new employees becomes easier and it lets you get acquainted with the tool within a short period of time.

The dashboard provides an intuitive view of your estimated time, tasks in progress, and project statuses. You can immediately view your day progress and make the necessary adjustments. It’s this clarity that allows you to master your time and keep yourself in the game throughout the day.

In addition, Timely provides customizable options to configure the interface as you wish. You can customize the presentation, tweak notification settings, and personal time commitment goals. This customization level makes Timely an enjoyable user experience so it integrates with your workflow.

Potential Drawbacks

Pricing can be an issue with small teams and freelancers, as the cost grows quickly with the higher tier plans. Occasionally there will be inaccurate automatic tracking, and you might have to enter corrections in manually, taking away from the user’s convenience. Limited offline options, not to mention an unreliable internet connection, also makes it problematic for Timely’s basic functions based on connectivity. 

Furthermore, the mobile app is occasionally prone to bugs, impacting those who use smartphones to track time. Additionally, it lacks integration with payroll systems, which can be a limitation for users seeking a comprehensive, all-in-one solution for both time tracking and payroll management.

Customer support

Customer reviews

Timely reviews are informative and show us what the platform is like from the point of view of other people. A unique feature is its automatic time tracking which will allow you to do the work without having to set and stop timers. This feature is great for freelancers and multiple project teams as it allows you to capture all the billable hours with zero errors.

The interface is praised as it is easy to navigate and the learning curve is reduced. Most customers love Timely’s robust reporting features that allows users to create custom reports to compare time usage and project execution. It makes the content more transparent when displayed to customers.

But there are some users that complain that the cost model isn’t affordable for small teams and freelancers. Overall the interface is easy to use, but certain higher-level features are a bit tricky to master, which means they could use some onboarding support. And lack of offline features is a disadvantage if you are traveling somewhere that does not have strong connections. Some reviewers point out that the automatic tracking might have some errors in reporting, like the system sometimes reports wrong activity.

Timely has a pretty good reputation overall, for its automatic time tracking, ease of use, and strong reporting tools. The system has flaws, but most users think that the advantages far outweigh the cons, so it’s a good option for freelancers and teams that need more productivity and time management.

How does it compare to its closest competitors

How does the biggest review sites rate Timely against its closest competitors

Conclusion

Timely, in short, is a solid, user-friendly time-tracking tool, best suited for enterprises and individuals who value automatic tracking, thorough reporting, and multi-platform integration. Although it is more pricy as opposed to some competitors, such as Clockify, the features and user-friendly design make it extremely value-for-money for a mid-sized team or a business with big projects.

Yet for freelancers or very small teams, there may be a cheaper alternative, say Toggl or Clockify, with similar usability and functionality. That decision will come down to what you need — whether that’s automatic tracking, project visibility in real time, or cross-platform integration. Timely manages to keep these features within a convenient interface that is very impressive and makes Timely one of the top time trackers out there.

Timely is suitable for…

• For businesses with a growing team who require time tracking on multiple projects.
• Ideally suited for companies with remote employees, providing cloud-based tracking and multi-platform support.
• Ideal for managers that need instant access to information about how time is distributed across tasks and workers.
• Lawyers, consultants, and agencies can benefit from Timely’s automated time tracking and reporting features to streamline billing and time management.
• Great for individuals or teams working on creative projects that need precise tracking.
• Best for those comfortable learning advanced features and using automation tools to optimize workflow.

Timely is not suitable for…

• Not ideal for very small teams or freelancers on a tight budget due to higher pricing.
• Not ideal for heavy offline usage as most functionality is powered by the internet on Timely.
• Unsuitable for users who prefer fully manual time tracking, as the platform emphasizes automation.
• Not a good fit for teams who want custom integrations outside of calendar syncing, or who use many tools that Timely doesn’t support.
• Teams with minimal tech skills might find it challenging to navigate some of the advanced features.

If you are not sure if Timely has exactly what you are looking for in a time tracking solution check out our Toggle Track review which is good for very small teams and freelancers.