Lawyers have to track their time for purposes of billable hours. It is also valuable to see where non-billable time is spent, too. This helps you reduce distracting or non-productive activities and refocuses the entire team on the most valuable tasks.

Finding the right timekeeping software for your firm can improve your ability to track billable hours. Here are some of the best options for tracking your time.

1. Toggl

Toggl makes time tracking easy. You can set different colors for various kinds of activities and name your projects. You can add as much or as little detail as you want for each action, and the service comes with a mobile app, too.

You can also view reports for any time period you’d like. This makes billing simple when you need to invoice a client for your time.

Toggl’s timer runs in the background, which can be helpful so long as you remember to start and stop it.

Key Features

• Track your time on the mobile version or web application
• Color-coding for tasks and projects
• End-of-week reports
• A free plan with unlimited time tracking and projects

Pricing

• Free plan
• Starter plan: $10/month, includes billable time and hours rounding
• Premium plan: $20/month with team tracking reminders and fixed fee projects
• Enterprise: Contact for pricing; unlimited workspaces available

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Very easy to use
• Law firms can get a lot out of the free plan
• Quickly grab reports at the end of the week for billing purposes

Cons

• Individual projects or clients must be created manually
• Must press the “start” button and tag tasks manually
• Easy to forget that the timer is running

2. MyHours

MyHours is another option built for people who work on an hourly basis rather than on flat-fee projects. It’s also good for bringing a team together to work on projects and tasks with timesheets.

Key Features

• Track time easily across individual or team projects
• Analytics and reporting show snapshots of time spent
• Good reporting features

Pricing

• Free: for individuals and small teams with unlimited projects or team members
• Paid: starts at $7/month per user with priority support, invoices, and log editing

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Offers a 30-day trial
• Solo or small law firms can get a lot out of the free version
• Run reports quickly on invoicing days
• Good customer support

Cons

• Few integrations with other tools
• No ability to automate daily reminders for team member billing
• Limited mobile app

3. Microsoft To-Do

If you want to combine task tracking and hourly billing without investing in an entire project management tool for your law firm, Microsoft To-Do may be a good fit. Typically, most law firms need something more robust for project management, but a solo lawyer just getting started might see some benefit to the simple task listing available here.

Key Features

• Keep track of customer contact details
• Task/project management
• Calendar sync
• Repeating tasks
• Simple time billing

Pricing

• Free plan: one user only
• Business plan: $9/user per month
• Max price: $99/month

Pros and Cons

Pros

• 14-day free trial
• Lots of integrations with third-party tools
• Solid mobile app

Cons

• Limited storage options
• Many users report bugs and crashes
• Many users say that checklists aren’t as functional as they could be

4. Everhour

Everhour is popular in multiple industries. Its powerful integrations allow you to easily budget, run payroll, and gather data for client invoicing.

You can also split billable and non-billable hours, capturing everything you work on. This allows you to keep client work separate from things like operations tasks.

Key Features

• Payroll management
• Budgeting capability
• Multiple billing rates
• Accounting integrations

Pricing

• Free tier for teams of up to 5
• Lite plan starts a $5/user/month for reminders, clients, billable rates, profit, invoicing, and API access
• Team plan at $8/user/month for time cards, expenses, and scheduling

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Perfect for managing projects at different billable rates
• Features for estimating time on projects
• Collaboration tools for the entire team
• Very easy to use

Cons

• Reports for new clients must be created manually
• Not all daily or weekly reports can be customized

5. TimeSolv

TimeSolv goes one step beyond time tracking, helping with things like invoicing and staff monitoring. It also has a lot of integrations with legal tech tools you might already use, like LawPay, Office 365, or QuickBooks.

This is one of the higher-priced tools, and some of the features, like project and document management, may be redundant. 

Key Features

• Invoicing
• Payments
• Document management
• Reporting
• Budgeting
• Time tracking
• Project management

Pricing

• 1-4 users: $39.95/user/month
• 5-14 users: $34.95/user/month
• Over 15 users: $29.95/user/month

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Offers a 30-day trial

• Set up tags/abbreviations for your popular projects
• Invoices are quick and easy to send
• Time entry is intuitive and user friendly

Cons

• Hard to move time entries
• Flat fee invoices are clunky
• Not as much personalization available on reports

6. TimeAnalytics

If you want to improve your productivity and capture billable and non-billable activities in the same place, this may be the right choice for you. Much like other tools, you can add and edit time manually or supply notes during or after a work session. 

Key Features

• Can track time off for your legal team
• Assign labor costs to specific cases
• Adjustable billing rates
• View logged time on a calendar or daily list

Pricing

• Starter plan: $5.99/user/month
• Optimum plan: $8.45/user/month for invoicing, profit report, email reminders

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Very user friendly
• Deep-dive reporting and timesheets for clients, teams, and projects
• Free 14-day trial

Cons

• No mobile app
• No free plan outside of the trial

7. RescueTime

RescueTime tracks all the time you spend on your computer automatically. This makes it most helpful for making sure that you or others are not overworking. 

RescueTime is not so much a time tracking tool when compared with some of the other tools on this list. It keeps a log of which apps you’re active in throughout the day. 

That’s a helpful feature, but you’ll need to plan around it. You may need to set aside time to see what RescueTime tracked. Then transfer your time logs to other tools for properly recording every minute of billable hours. 

Key Features

• Review time spent on various websites and apps
• Daily reminders of productivity goals
• Tie activities into their level of productivity
• Time reporting
• Distraction blocking

Pricing

• Free: basic time reporting only
• $12/user/month for calendar and music integrations, history reports, focus features

Pros and Cons

Pros

• 14-day free trial
• Runs in the background
• Automatic weekly reporting
• Can set automated daily emails for hitting productivity goals
• Blocks distractions

Cons

• Categorizes time spent at a broad level like “Google Docs” rather than specific projects
• Limited exports
• Time categories are somewhat restricted

8. Timely

If you’re a visual person but want automated time recording, this is the perfect blend for you. This user-friendly software will help get your whole law firm up to speed on the tasks that matter most.

Key Features

• Automated time tracking
• Watch for problems like overtime or employee capacity limits
• Collaborate and plan as a team
• Many integrations with other tools

Pricing

• $11/user/month for 50 projects and 3 teams
• $20/user/month for unlimited projects and teams
• $28/user/month to see all employee activity or send clients live reports

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Drag and drop interface to add new hours
• Automation makes things easy for you
• Very user friendly

Cons

• Certain tasks may not be properly tagged or logged in the AI system
• Inability to set up automated logging for tasks with specific criteria
• Doesn’t always follow Google calendar order when sending reports

9. Beebole

If you like the ease of running the clock from your phone or a browser, you can easily track your time with Beebole. You can customize your reports and make decisions based on the tool’s powerful team reporting.

Key Features

• See where your team is spending their time
• Clear user interface
• Assign billable vs. non-billable hours
• Google and Excel reporting capabilities

Pricing

• $6.99/user/month

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Good customer service with broad business hours coverage
• 30-day free trial
• One price with unlimited clients, reports, and projects
• Design your own reports and send them to anyone

Cons

• Limited integrations with some users reporting bugs
• Not as easy to use as other tools
• Some people report that the web app can be buggy

10. Amberlo

Amberlo comes with a lot of possible benefits for law firms of all sizes. This is especially true if you need more than just expenses and time tracking. Billing and management features make it more holistic than other tools.

Key Features

• Time tracking
• Expense tracking
• Calendar
• Document management
• Matter/contract management
• Billing
• Trust accounting tools

Pricing

• Free for single users
• $35/user/month for Office 365/Google calendar integrations and more document storage

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Automatically record each minute logged
• More comprehensive than other tools
• Ability to email clients
• Intuitive to use

Cons

• No integration for Dropbox or Google Drive
• Limited reporting
• Some users say that the mobile app is not as detailed as they’d like

Do Lawyers Need Standalone Time Tracking Software?

For most lawyers, the answer depends on your law firm’s tech tool stack.

If your practice management tool or project management tool has built-in time tracking, you may not need one of these apps.

If your tools don’t have built-in tracking features, then you may need a standalone app. This is especially true if you cannot deviate from the tools you use.

Having a separate time tracking app from your other tools adds a degree of complication. You might have to take extra steps for accurate reporting.

You may need a system to take the time from your tracker and log it in your practice management tool. 

This extra step can cost you some efficiency. It’s still better than not tracking time at all. And it’s a good way to balance time-tracking with your software requirements.

Features to Look for In a Timekeeping Tool

There are a few important features to consider before choosing a timekeeping tool. Of particular importance are how well it plays with other tools, what reporting looks like, and your support options.

Integrations with Your Other Tools

Time tracking tools that work with the software you already use are better than those that don’t. Integrated tools cut the need to hop back and forth between apps. This prevents you from losing time and your focus from context switching.

Some time-tracking tools can automatically track the time you spend on different apps. They can even rate your productivity or distraction level. You can assign a high productivity score to time spent on apps like your case management tool, Microsoft Word, or Zoom meetings.

You could then export daily, weekly, or yearly reports to see how you spend your time.

Analytics and Reporting Features

Fully-featured apps with analytics and reporting can help you get a handle on your utilization rate, productivity, and more. When you know these details, you can make more informed decisions.

Notice that you’re spending a lot of time in team meetings and fewer billable hours than you’d like? You can implement changes in your office to flip the two.

The analytics and reporting features should be helpful and not overwhelming. Make sure you’ll get something useful from it, whether it’s a visual chart or a weekly email report.

Customer Support

Technical support is a necessity because you must accurately log billable hours. Anything that goes wrong with your time tracking could jeopardize this crucial metric.

The tool you choose shouldn’t leave you to your own devices. If something goes wrong, you need a tool that will give you timely and helpful assistance.

Track Your Time Effectively to Grow Your Firm

It’s much easier to grow a law firm when you know where you spend your time and how you can better optimize it. By combining time tracking with your other tools, you can become more focused on the tasks at hand.

Managing a law firm requires balancing several disparate factors. One of those factors is having the right tools at your disposal to get work done effectively.

Rankings.io has many resources to help you see what other lawyers are using in their firms to go to the next level. If you’re interested in learning more, good places to start include our guides to productivity for lawyers, law practice management software, client intake software, and project management software.

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