The Better Alternative to DeskTime

Looking for a simpler and more intuitive way to track time – without intrusive monitoring and screeshots? Then you’ve come to the right place.

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DeskTime vs. timeBuzzer

Software

DeskTime is a time tracking software that focuses on productivity monitoring by tracking app & website usage and randomly capturing screenshots on users screens.

Best for: Remote teams that want to measure productivity or monitor their employees productivity.

Feature highlights:

Detailed URL & app tracking, simple productivity reports, detailed document title tracking, automatic screenshots capturing send to cloud

DeskTime offers a desktop app for macOS, Windows, and Linux.

The app mainly runs in the background and tracks programs and captures screenshots automatically.

To enable its core productivity monitoring and screenshot features, users are required to grant Security and Privacy permissions on their operating system, including access to screen and audio recording as well as access to documents and data. This raises privacy concerns, as sensitive data can be sent to DeskTime’s servers.

The app also offers the possibility to assign certain activities to projects and tasks and displays those timesteps in a list, but it doesn’t give you much control to easily edit those, like changing the duration or adding specific notes to tasks which makes it less suited for project-based time tracking.

For on the go, DeskTime offers a mobile app for iOS and Android. In comparison to their desktop app, the mobile app does not track your phone usage time and just gives you insights what team members are doing.

timeBuzzer is a time tracking software with optional hardware that focuses on accurate project-based time tracking by making it effortless, intuitive, and hard to forget.

Best for: Freelancers, agencies and small to medium-sized service businesses that want to track and bill their projects.

Feature highlights:

Effortless project time tracking, customizable layer system, clear reports, easy-to-use team & role management & member assignments

timeBuzzer also offers a desktop app for macOS, Windows, and Linux.

Instead of silently monitoring computer activities and taking screenshots, timeBuzzer puts the user in control of his time and provides a simple timer (that can also be easily controlled with their hardware add-on) and an intuitive timeline that displays all time entries, giving users a clear overview of their day.

The app allows users to enable notifications and reminders and supports users with an helpful idle detection feature, in case users forget to stop the timer.

Users can also edit time entries in the app via drag and drop or easily add further time entries via click and drag. At timeBuzzer we deliberately avoid features like screenshot tracking as we believe successful time tracking is built on trust and simplicity, not surveillance.

For on the go, timeBuzzer also offers a mobile app for iOS and Android. Like the desktop app, it provides users with a simple timer that allows them to easily start and stop timers, as well as the ability to manage recorded time entries.

Hardware

DeskTime is entirely software-based and does not support dedicated hardware for project-based time tracking.

Users must manually open the app and change the selection in the dropdowns to assign activities to specific projects and tasks.

timeBuzzer offers an optional desktop buzzer alongside its software, turning time tracking into something simple and fun — and making it easy to capture even short activities like e‑mails or phone calls that often go untracked.

Learn more about the desktop buzzer

Integrations

DeskTime offers an open API and various integrations, including automation platforms, making it easy to connect with your existing tools.

timeBuzzer offers an open API and various integrations, including automation platforms, making it easy to connect with your existing tools.

Pricing

DeskTime’s software subscription plans cost up to $10 per user per month, with a 10% discount on annual billing equivalent to one month free.

A 14-day free trial is available without requiring credit card details.

Cancellation: You can cancel your subscription at any time; it will remain active until the end of the billing cycle. According to DeskTime, data is retained for 13 months after cancellation.

timeBuzzer‘s software subscriptions cost up to €10 per user per month, with a 20% discount for annual billing. The optional desktop buzzer costs a one-time fee of €59 per device and comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee, so you can try it risk-free. Volume discounts are available when purchasing multiple devices.

A free 15-day trial of all the paid software features iis available without requiring credit card details. If you order at least one desktop buzzer to test, your software trial is automatically extended to 30 days!

Cancellation: You can cancel your subscription at any time. It will remain active until the end of the billing cycle, after which you’ll smoothly transition to our free limited version. Your data remains securely stored and fully accessible again the moment you resubscribe.

Support

DeskTime, based in Latvia, offers support in English via email and live chat Monday to Friday, 9:00 AM – 10:00 PM EEST.

A Help Center is available in English and Spanish, offering detailed documentation, FAQs, and video tutorials for self-service.

Support levels vary by plan, with paid users potentially receiving faster response times and enhanced assistance.

timeBuzzer, based in Germany, EU, offers support in English and German via email and scheduled calls within 24 hours, during business hours from Monday to Friday, 9 am–6 pm CET you usually can expect much faster response times.

A Help Center is available in English and German, offering detailed documentation, FAQs, and video tutorials for self-service.

All users receive equal, personalized assistance, and user feedback is actively incorporated into product development.

Conclusion

DeskTime could be a good choice if you’re looking for a time tracking tool that measures app usage, monitors productivity, and can regularly take screenshots in the background to oversee employee activity.

timeBuzzer could be the perfect fit if you’re looking for a time tracking tool that prioritizes ease of use, offers effortless, highly accurate tracking, and respects your team’s privacy.

Real people. Real results.

See how timeBuzzer makes a difference.

“Roughly speaking, we save about 3–4 hours per employee per week. We also tend to bill more — around 10% — because we can now record activities more accurately”

Christian Euler
HOCH3 GmbH

“We used to track our time with spreadsheets, which was a pain and often forgotten. With timeBuzzer, our time tracking is now more flexible and yet easier to use. Especially the billing of projects has never been so easy and reliable.”

Katrin Schuler
KP PressConsulting

“We save around 30–60 minutes per employee per day. Billing has also become significantly more precise – we can clearly show which services were delivered and avoid any uncertainties.”

Marc Lübbers
beeNoord Marketing