It’s hard to know where to start when looking for the best free time clock app for your small business. There are a lot of options out there with a million different features. How can you tell which free time clock app is right for you?
We’ll take you through the ins and outs of time clock apps. We’ll look at the following:
- The definition of a time clock app
- How a time clock app can benefit your business
- The most important features of a time clock app
- The eight most popular time clock apps on the market
And as promised, we’ll share our pick for the best in free time clock apps.
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What’s a time clock app?
A time clock is a device that employees use to record when they clock in and out of their shifts. A time clock app is a digital solution to analog time clocks. When using a time clock app, employees can clock in and out of work via their phone, desktop, laptop, or other digital devices. All the data is stored online, which makes it much easier to manage than paper time cards or inconvenient spreadsheets.
Many time clock apps also include software integrations that allow management to optimize schedules, edit timesheets, and streamline the payroll process.
How can a time clock app help your business?
Whether you’re looking to upgrade your current time tracking system or exploring time tracking for the first time, time clock apps are the perfect solution.
Manual time tracking is unreliable, time-consuming for you and your employees, and can have a negative impact on your business from a financial perspective. Let’s explore how a digital time clock app can benefit your business.
Reduce instances of time theft
Time theft happens when employees aren’t working when they are being paid. Time theft is illegal, and it does impact your bottom line. While not always intentional, time theft and timesheet fraud are issues that you should address with your employees.
Time theft happens for a variety of reasons. Buddy punching is one of the most common types of time theft. Buddy punching is when a coworker is running late or doesn’t show up for their shift, so they have another coworker clock in for them. 75% of businesses in the United States lose money because of buddy punching.
With some digital time clock apps, each employee will be assigned a unique ID, and the app takes a picture of whoever is clocking in. This effectively eliminates the ability to buddy punch.
Make record keeping easy and accurate
When you rely on traditional paper timesheets, they’re often inaccurate. While this all comes down to human error, you may end up underpaying employees or paying for work that wasn’t completed.
Digital time clock apps securely store your information on the cloud and keep detailed, error-free records. These accurate reports mean you’ll stay compliant and be able to pay your employees correctly.
Use automation to simplify repetitive tasks
Repetitive tasks can become tedious, making everyone’s jobs a little less enjoyable. Not to mention the fact that they negatively impact productivity. Employees spend 40% of their time on repetitive tasks. Imagine what you could do if you reclaimed even 10% of that time.
Time clock apps put a lot of that time back in your pocket by automating repetitive tasks. You get the time back and benefit from a reduced human error introduced to time tracking and payroll.
Stay compliant with local, state, and federal labor laws
A time tracking system like a time clock app can help to keep you compliant with local, state, and federal labor laws. A time clock app should be able to keep track of employee breaks and overtime. This information gives you transparency into how many hours have been worked by an employee. You’ll have a clear picture of when a team member is about to surpass their work hour limits, ensuring you’re not violating labor laws.
What to look for in a free time clock app
There are lots of different time clock apps on the market. It helps to know what to look for when deciding which free option to use. To make your decision process easier, look for free time clock apps that have some or all of these features:
- Remote time editing. Whether at your business location or on the road, you should be able to view and edit employee time entries easily.
- Accuracy and buddy punching prevention. Your time clock app should have measures to avoid buddy punching and ensure the accuracy of time entries.
- Compliance management. A time clock should help keep you compliant. Look for an app that notifies you when an employee shows up late, approaches overtime, or misses a break.
Additionally, a complete time tracking system should be able to automate tasks like:
- Running payroll
- Approving PTO requests
- Reminding employees of upcoming shifts
- Issuing and sending out vital forms and documents like 1099s and W-2s
8 free time clock apps
Now that you know what to look for in a time clock app, let’s explore some of the best free options available. From notable features to pros and cons, we’re laying it all out for the eight best free time clock apps.
1. Homebase
Homebase is the best free time clock app for small businesses and hourly teams. It’s is more than a great time tracking solution: it’s an all-in-one team management tool. Time tracking, scheduling, hiring and onboarding, payroll, team communication, and HR and compliance tools work together to help you manage your team and their time seamlessly.
With the Homebase time tracking app, your employees can either clock in or out from their mobile devices once they arrive at work, or use a tablet, computer, or POS device that you have set up at work for this purpose. From there, you’ll have everything you need to track their hours, breaks, overtime, and time off.
The app’s GPS and geo-fencing capabilities are essential if you have remote or off-site employees. These features give you the peace of mind that everyone’s signing into work at the right place and time.
Notable features
- Time tracking
- Timesheets
- Alerts, reminders, and notifications
- Clock-in photos
- Employee scheduling
- Time off tracking
- Built-in integrations like Square and QuickBooks
- Unique PINs for employee clock-ins
- GPS tracking
- Geo-fencing
- Hiring and onboarding
- Payroll
- HR and compliance
Pros and cons
Homebase is your one-stop shop for everything you need to run your business. Homebase was made explicitly to meet the needs of small business owners. So you can be confident that you are getting the best solution for your business.
Best of all, Homebase’s time tracking app is free for up to 20 employees at one location and also includes scheduling, messaging, and hiring features.
Homebase time clock’s geo-fencing capabilities aren’t as flawlessly accurate as some on-site biometric clock-in pads. But using our time clock app versus a biometric time clock provides a better employee experience, helps foster a professional relationship built on mutual trust, and saves you the headache of meeting the legal requirements of biometric time clocks.
Small business owners can easily track employee hours, and save time with the free Homebase time tracking app, the smarter time clock solution.
2. Clockify
Clockify is a simple time tracking and timesheet app. This app best suits agencies and freelancers looking to categorize their work by tasks and projects. There’s also a manual GPS tracker to keep employees accountable and alerts reminding them to log their hours.
Notable features
- Time tracking
- Timesheets
- Employee scheduling
- Alerts, reminders, and notifications
- Invoicing tool
- Payroll integration
- GPS tracking
Pros and cons
Clockify is easy to use and perfect for people needing time tracking capabilities. It’s available in English and Spanish, making it a good fit for multilingual teams.
However, it’s mainly targeted at agencies and freelancers. Clockify is best suited to project management, so small business owners won’t have access to all the features they need to run their businesses smoothly.
3. TrackingTime
TrackingTime is a clock app that lets you visualize how your team spends their time. You can view time in day, month, week, and even by team calendar views. You can track time, monitor projects, and create branded client reports.
Notable features
- Time tracking
- Timesheets
- Project management
- Branded business reports
- Invoicing tool
Pros and cons
TrackingTime is excellent for businesses that want a visual representation of how their team spends their time across multiple projects. You can manually add time entries and create automated ones for repetitive tasks like meetings.
However, this app doesn’t have scheduling functionality. And, payroll integration is only available in the paid version. TrackingTime is also best suited for full-time employees and wasn’t created with shift and hourly workers in mind.
4. FindMyShift
Find My Shift is an employee management system that features a free time tracking app. The time clock app allows you to record and report when employees are at work through a web-based time clock station or a mobile app.
Notable features
- Time tracking
- Timesheets
- Shift management
- Alerts, reminders, and notifications
- GPS tracking
Pros and cons
FindMyShift has useful scheduling tools, including approving/rejecting employee shift requests and generating timesheets. It also has location tracking that can be turned on or off to help verify employees’ location when they clock in and out.
However, the free version of FindMyShift only allows you to have five users. While this may be enough for some small businesses, others might need to upgrade to the paid plan. The paid plan will cost a minimum of $25 USD per team monthly.
5. OnTheClock
OnTheClock allows employees to clock in and out from any device management authorizes. It has geofencing and GPS tracking capabilities, making it easy to keep track of employees’ locations when they are clocked in.
Notable features
- Time tracking
- Alerts, reminders, and notifications
- GPS tracker
- Geofencing
- Time off tracking
- Employee scheduling
Pros and cons
OnTheClock has a lot of features, including employee scheduling that uses an intuitive drag-drop system that can save time when creating hourly schedules.
However, the free version of the app is limited to only two users. If you upgrade to manage your entire team, OnTheClock starts at $102 USD per month.
6. Connecteam
Connecteam is a time clock app that works well for teams that work in the field. Employees can clock in and out using smartphones, and their location will automatically be tracked. Managers can monitor who clocks in and out—and from where—in real-time.
Notable features
- Time tracking
- Timesheets
- Alerts, reminders, and notifications
- GPS tracker
- Payroll
- Time off tracking
- Employee scheduling
Pros and cons
Connecteam is free for up to ten uses, making it affordable for many small businesses. It offers a lot of customization options, so you can configure it to work with your needs.
However, there are a lot of upgrades within the app that come at an additional cost. Users also note that the setup can be complicated for teams with little technical expertise.
7. OpenSimSim
OpenSimSim is a free time clock app for small businesses with one location, one department, and ten scheduled employees. It has some interesting features like availability and time off tracking. It works well for businesses in the food service industry.
Notable features
- Time tracking
- Timesheets
- Alerts, reminders, and notifications
- Time off tracking
- Availability tracking
Pros and cons
OpenSimSim helps keep overtime costs in check by tracking hours worked, breaks, and overtime.
However, you’ll need to upgrade to the paid version to get more in-depth features like GPS tracking and photo confirmation. Prices for those features start at $33.99 per month per location.
8. Time Clock Wizard
Time Clock Wizard is a great basic time tracking app. While the app has a lot of great features, the free version is limited to remote employee time tracking.
Notable features
- Time tracking
Pros and cons
Time Clock Wizard has phone, chat, and email support available for its free users. It also allows you to have an unlimited number of users.
However, the free version is limited to a simple time tracking app and includes no other features. You’ll need to upgrade to a paid account starting at $19.95 USD a month to access features like timesheet reports and alerts and the mobile app.
The best free time clock app for your small business
While there are a lot of free time clock apps on the market, Homebase is the best free time clock app for your small business. Homebase was designed for small businesses and goes beyond your standard time tracking software. It also gives you:
- Real-time tracking: whenever, wherever
- PTO and sick leave request tracking
- GPS location features
- Simple and secure clock-ins and clock-outs
- Offline application management
Homebase helps you manage your work schedules, time clocks, payroll, HR, and more, so you can focus on what matters most—your team.
A free time clock that frees up your time.
Track hours. Prep for payroll. Control labor costs. All with our easy time clock. Try the Homebase time clock for free
Free time clock app FAQs
What is a time clock app?
A time clock app is a digital solution to recording when an employee clocks in and out of their shift at work. Employees use mobile phones, desktop computers, laptops, tablets, or other digital devices to clock in and out. All the data is stored online, making it easy to manage.
What are the most important features of a time clock app?
Everyone will need to determine the most important time clock app features for their business. Some of the most popular features of time clock apps include:
- Time tracking
- Automatically generate timesheets
- Notifications to remind employees of upcoming shifts
- Alerts to notify managers of potential overtime and scheduling issues
- Clock-in photos to reduce buddy punching
- Unique PINs for employee clock-ins to ensure accuracy
- Employee scheduling
- Time off tracking
- GPS tracking
- Geo-fencing
What is the best free time clock app?
Homebase is the best free time clock app, and it was designed to fit the needs of small businesses and hourly teams. With the Homebase time tracking app, your employees use their mobile devices to clock in and out of work. After tracking their time, you’ll have everything you need to track hours, breaks, time off, and overtime.
The app features GPS and geo-fencing to avoid buddy punching and time theft and also includes scheduling, hiring and onboarding, payroll, team communication, and HR and compliance tools.
Want to set your team up for success with accurate time clocks and time tracking? Get started with Homebase for free.
Remember: This is not legal advice. If you have questions about your particular situation, please consult a lawyer, CPA, or other appropriate professional advisor or agency.
