The 5 Best Employee Scheduling and Time Tracking Software

Employee scheduling and time tracking software solves many of the most difficult parts of workforce management, from filling open shifts to making sure employees are paid properly.

In this post, we’re taking a look at the five best employee scheduling and time tracking software, each chosen based on the features they include, how flexible they are for a variety of business types, and their customer reviews. 

1. Buddy Punch – Best for multi-location businesses and field services teams

Buddy Punch is a user-friendly and versatile time tracking and employee scheduling software that’s been adopted by over 10,000 businesses. Our tool has proven particularly effective for small businesses. You can use it to track employee hours, create schedules, manage PTO, and run payroll. 

We created Buddy Punch to be this versatile for one simple reason: it’s the sort of software we wished was on the market when we needed it. At our previous business, we relied on manual methods of timekeeping and scheduling to manage 20 employees at three different locations. It was unsustainable, inefficient, and worse, was preventing us from improving our productivity.

Back then, time tracking and scheduling tools either lacked the sort of functions we needed to monitor our employees and encourage greater productivity, or they seemed overly complicated and difficult for team members to learn. It seemed like there was no tool that managed to be both versatile and intuitive.

So we set out to create our own, and Buddy Punch was born.

Why Buddy Punch stands out

Our primary concern while designing Buddy Punch was ease of use. We wanted to ensure that any employee could use the tool regardless of how tech-savvy they were.

As you can see in the image above, employees are only presented with the most necessary options when they log in. They can clock in, clock out, and view their schedule. No other distractions, no need to jump through several hoops before your team members can get to work.

Buddy Punch can be accessed on any device with an internet connection, including computers, tablets, and mobile apps. This means your employees can clock in and out and view their schedules from anywhere. There’s no need for them to come into a central office to see when they work or punch in/out. 

How Buddy Punch streamlines employee scheduling

Employee scheduling should be as quick, simple and painless as possible. Additionally, team members should be able to fully understand when they’re expected to work at a glance. There are a few ways Buddy Punch helps achieve this.

Drag-and-drop scheduling

Buddy Punch makes it easy for you to schedule your employees. Create shifts on the calendar by simply clicking on an empty cell, then drag and drop shifts as needed. This level of ease paired with the ability to visualize scheduled employees helps ensure there are no gaps in coverage. 

Shift trades 

Tired of dealing with last-minute schedule changes when an employee puts in a leave request or has an emergency? The shift trades feature helps alleviate your responsibilities and puts power in your team members’ hands. Employees can trade shifts or request someone to cover their shift. Once a match is made, you’ll receive those shift trade requests and can approve or deny them. 

Shift notifications

Once you’ve made a schedule, all relevant employees will receive a notification to ensure they know when they’re expected to work. You can also set up notifications for events such as approaching the end of a shift, needing to submit timecards, for employees to remember to punch in or punch out, and more.

How Buddy Punch improves time tracking

Buddy Punch empowers you to make sure that employees are where they need to be when they need to be there, focused on tasks during work hours — even if you’re not present to ensure it. This is accomplished through the following features.

Geofencing

Create a radius on an interactive map, known as a geofence, up to a circumference of 5,000 feet. Whenever an employee attempts to clock in or clock out while outside of a geofence, they’ll be denied. Create multiple geofences at will and use this to exert control over remote retail locations or on construction job sites without being present.

GPS tracking

Buddy Punch’s GPS tracking allows you to monitor where your remote and field workers are while they’re on the clock. There are two options you have here: tracking employees while they’re on the clock in real-time, or only logging employee locations the moment they clock in and clock out.

Regardless of how you choose to ensure team members are where they’re meant to be while on the clock, Buddy Punch preserves privacy by immediately ceasing data tracking once your staff members clock out.

PTO tracking

Easily monitor employee PTO through the most common types or by creating custom types at will. All paid time off taken will automatically appear on employees’ time cards. As team members request time off, you’ll receive a notification for easy approval or denial. You can even take things a step further and enable auto-approval on leave requests.

Buddy Punch’s PTO tracking comes paired with a built-in PTO accrual feature to determine how paid leave accumulates for your employees.

Facial recognition

Buddy Punch’s facial recognition helps solve most concerns about time theft in the workplace. Buddy Punch uses Face ID to scan an employee’s face as they clock in, comparing it with a verified screenshot on file. No employee will be able to clock in for another employee with this security feature enabled.

How Buddy Punch helps you run payroll

Tracking employee data accurately is extremely useful, but it could still be a hassle to wrangle this information when it comes time for payroll. That’s why we included several payroll-related features in Buddy Punch to cut down on human error and streamline the entire payroll process for business owners. 

Payroll integrations

Attached to third-party payroll software? Buddy Punch integrates directly with many of the most popular tools on the market, making it easy to transfer over your employee data without hassle or risk of human error skewing numbers. We integrate directly with Zapier, QuickBooks, ADP, and more. Click here to view the full integrations list.

Job codes / project tracking

Buddy Punch allows you to set up job codes, departments, or locations as a method of tracking employee time for specific tasks and projects. You can assign these codes to employees or let them clock in and select the specific task or project they’re working on.

How much time does it take Kyle, Jake, and Chris to finish up on a construction site? How quickly can Jane and Bill restock your shelves? This feature lets you answer these questions by recording the time employees spend on tasks. When you run payroll reports, you’ll see exactly how much time was spent on each project.

Payroll reports and exports

Buddy Punch offers customizable reports to accompany many of its features, including payroll. In just a few clicks Buddy Punch calculates everything you need for payroll, exported in Excel CSV or Adobe PDF format.

Built-in payroll

For business owners that are open to upgrading their payroll software, Buddy Punch offers a comprehensive payroll option. Turn Buddy Punch into your all-in-one solution for all things employee management and take advantage of features such as:

• Anywhere, anytime payroll
• Automatic payroll tax filings and payments
• In-depth employee data for workforce insights
• Paperless payroll

Buddy Punch’s other features

Believe it or not, we’ve still only scratched the surface when it comes to features Buddy Punch has for business owners. There are other options as well, such as QR codes scanning, overtime calculations, group punches, timesheet editing, automatic punch outs, and more.

You have a full arsenal at your fingertips that you can pick and choose from depending on what works best for your workforce management style.

2. DeskTime – Best for computer-based teams

DeskTime is an all-in-one time tracker and employee scheduling tool for small businesses with a major focus on features that are meant to boost employee productivity. According to their data, on average they can improve stats by 30% — a bold claim, but one that’s believable considering their features.

Key features

• Time tracking: Desktime considers this the very core of what their tool is all about: precise tracking of work hours, clock in and out times, and employee breaks. Make use of both automatic and manual time tracking to get a comprehensive view of how time is spent while employees are on the clock.
• Performance evaluation: DeskTime allows you to take a deeper dive into tracked time data. Understand not just what your team members are doing, but for how long they’re engaged in each activity. Track URLs and apps, productivity, projects, and even document titles to ensure everyone’s working on their assignments.
• Reporting: View all the in-depth information gathered by DeskTime at will. Understand how your team’s performance ebbs and flows over time and export the data to create physical records that you can use to create benchmarks to exceed in the future.
• Scheduling: Streamline your team management through the use of DeskTime’s features to organize work hours and oversee staff absences. Make use of shift scheduling and an absence calendar to exert greater control over employee attendance.

Customer reviews

Desktime has a score of 4.6/5 on Capterra. Here’s what one reviewer had to say:

“Attendance and productivity are typically managed by managers along with HR, but processes are usually manual and takes a lot of time. This allowed management and HR to have a tool to monitor and inspect productivity and attendance more effectively.”

3. When I Work – Best for automated employee scheduling

When I Work is a tool that specifically focuses on optimization of work schedule creation and management for business owners. Their goal is to provide a modern solution for scheduling that works on desktop and mobile apps alike.

Key features

• Employee scheduling: When I Work’s main component. Shift management is meant to be drastically simplified through tools such as auto scheduling, task assignment, schedule templates, and remote job sites. Save hours by creating schedules in mere minutes.
• Time clock: The When I Work time clock ensures accurate time tracking regardless of employee circumstances or locations. This feature comes with GPS tracking for remote workers, labor cost management, absenteeism monitoring, timesheet editing, and more.
• Team messaging: Manage team communication all in one centralized app. When I Work allows you to bring team messaging under one private and secure roof, allowing you to improve team member cooperation through options such as one-on-one communication, broadcast messaging, group messaging, and notifications.
• Integrations: When I Work has many third-party integrations to make it easy to slot this into your pre-established routine. They have options from payroll, to point of sale, to on-demand pay, working perfectly with names such as Gusto, Square, ADP, and more. 

Customer reviews

When I Work has a score of 4.5/5 on Capterra. Here’s what one user had to say about it:

“When I Work was an answered prayer for our personnel department. We recently underwent a large expansion that added several employees, contractors, and locations. By shifting to When I Work, we have been able to eliminate the need for a separate staff member to oversee employee attendance and productivity.”

4. Connecteam – Best free scheduling and time tracking tool for small businesses

Connecteam has enough versatile features to be an all-in-one time tracking, scheduling, and workforce management tool. They offer you full control over your business, from scheduling and training to payroll.

Key features

• Time clock: Connecteam lets you accurately track employee work hours and submit timesheets for payroll in a click. You can also monitor attendance in real-time with notifications and enhanced dashboard visibility. 
• Scheduling: Connecteam makes it easy to create optimized schedules with ease. You can view employee availability, qualifications, and preferences while you’re setting up schedules. Then, quickly build them with templates and duplicates, or let auto-scheduling take control. 
• Task management: Connecteam makes it easy to track employee task completion, all from your mobile device. You can even set up one-time tasks with due dates or establish recurring tasks in order to automate daily assignments among your team. 
• Forms and checklists: Connecteam has a fairly unique feature with its digital forms, which allow you to create forms and checklists for employees to fill out. These provide digestible breakdowns of tasks for team members to complete in order to boost their productivity.

Customer reviews

Connecteam has a rating of 4.7 out of 5 stars on Capterra. Here’s what one user has to say about it:

“Connecteam has helped with managing our employee work time and scheduling tremendously. I have slowly implemented more and more features to benefit our company as a whole, and I have been extremely happy with what I have implemented so far. The customer service has always been outstanding! I am never disappointed in their service.”

5. Clockify – Best for agencies and professional services businesses

Clockify is an incredibly popular time tracker and scheduler, mostly because it has one of the most flexible free plans on the market. That said, most of its more powerful features are locked behind paid plans.

Key features

• Timer: Easily track the time spent on tasks in your workplace. Clockify’s one click timer is as simple to use as entering the activity you’re working on then starting the timer. You can organize categories based on projects, tasks, tags, status, and more.
• Timesheets: Clockify allows you and your employees to categorize and log time spent on different projects and tasks, along with additional information such as notes, tags, and more. You can also make use of templates to quickly populate timesheets with the most common activities for your workplace.
• Calendar: Clockify allows you and your team members to visualize your days and organize time. Use the timeline feature to view days in blocks, use total time to see total tracked time throughout the week, zoom in 5, 15, 30, or 60-minute time blocks, and more.
• Scheduling: Use Clockify’s built-in scheduling to plan shifts and resources and allocate workloads to your team members. You can see views of all assignments on a timeline from different perspectives, enabling you to better identify gaps and points of optimization.

Customer reviews

Clockify has a score of 4.8/5 on Capterra. Here’s what one user had to say:

“Clockify is a very easy to set up platform. Once one signs up, the functionality is available in minutes. It is easy to set up team members. The reporting is also straightforward; I use it to download my time with multiple clients into Excel.”

Choosing the right employee scheduling and time tracking software for your business

The journey to finding the perfect employee management software ends with a clear understanding of your own business. Each tool we’ve covered offers a unique strength, from Buddy Punch’s robust feature set to Connecteam’s excellent free plan for small businesses.

Your task now is to match those strengths to your biggest needs. Define your budget, list your essential features, and take a couple of contenders for a test drive.

The perfect solution is out there, and with a little homework, you’re sure to find the platform that makes scheduling, time tracking, and payroll the easiest part of your day.