With the rise of remote and hybrid work models, managing workforce productivity has become more important than ever. To do so, businesses need reliable tools to track employee activity, analyze work patterns, and ensure efficiency without micromanaging. This is where software like ActivTrak and Time Doctor come into play.
ActivTrak provides workforce analytics, helping businesses gain visibility into employee productivity. Its data-driven approach allows companies to identify inefficiencies and improve operational performance.
In a similar fashion, Time Doctor focuses on time tracking and productivity monitoring. It helps businesses optimize team performance and ensure accountability in a remote-first environment.
This blog will compare ActivTrak and Time Doctor, exploring their features, benefits, and how they support businesses in managing productivity more effectively.
ActivTrak Vs Time Doctor: At A Glance
Features
ActivTrak
Time Doctor
Time Tracking
Offers automatic time tracking
Offers both automatic and manual time tracking
Employee Monitoring
Automatically collects data on application and website usage, categorizing activities as productive or unproductive
Tracks time spent on tasks and projects alongside features such as screenshot capture
Analytics
Features customizable dashboards, productivity reports, etc.
Provides an executive dashboard that offers an overview of team performance
Integrations
Offers an API that allows the software to integrate with various business systems as well as third-party software
Integrates with project management tools and payroll software
Pricing
Starts with a free version
Starts at $8/user/month
What Is ActivTrak?
ActivTrak is a workforce analytics and productivity management platform designed to provide organizations with insights into employee work patterns and behaviors. It offers tools for employee monitoring, productivity measurement, and workforce planning, enabling businesses to optimize performance and operational efficiency.
Key features include real-time visibility into team activity, time tracking, application and website usage monitoring, and AI-driven productivity coaching. ActivTrak emphasizes data privacy and security, ensuring compliance with standards such as CCPA, GDPR, and HIPAA while deliberately avoiding intrusive monitoring methods like keystroke logging and video recording.
The platform caters to organizations of various sizes and industries, particularly those managing remote or hybrid teams. It serves roles across IT, operations, human resources, finance, sales, support, and contact centers, offering tailored insights to improve productivity and employee engagement.
Unique ActivTrak Features
Workload Management Tools: ActivTrak includes workload management tools that identify overworked employees and those with lower workloads.
Customizable Data Dashboards: The software provides fully customizable dashboards that allow managers to tailor analytics to business needs, displaying only relevant productivity metrics.
ActivTrak Pros And Cons
Pros:
Allows managers to monitor their employees’ productivity in real time
Easy to install and use
Provides proper documentation to deal with any infractions
Cons:
According to some users, the mobile app can be improved
It can consume quite a lot of storage
What Is Time Doctor?
Time Doctor Software is a software-as-a-service (SaaS) time-tracking and productivity monitoring tool developed by Time Doctor, LLC, designed to help organizations and individuals manage time effectively and enhance productivity. It offers features such as transparent time tracking, streamlined work schedules, project tracking, accurate automated reporting, and powerful team and executive dashboards.
The platform caters to a wide range of industries and is suitable for businesses of all sizes, from small startups to large enterprises. It is particularly beneficial for organizations with remote or hybrid teams, providing real-time insights into workflows and ensuring accountability. Finally, Time Doctor supports multiple operating systems and is available in several languages, making it accessible to a global user base.
Unique Time Doctor Features
Payroll And Billing Integration: Time Doctor integrates with payroll processing platforms like PayPal, Wise, and Gusto, enabling automated payments based on tracked hours.
Mouse/Keyboard Activity Tracking: Time Doctor includes keystroke and mouse activity detection to confirm active work time and prevent idle tracking abuse.
Time Doctor Pros And Cons
Pros:
Provides online time tracking
Supported on multiple platforms
Takes screenshots, allowing managers to verify whether employees are working or not
Cons:
It can cause minor slowdowns due to occasionally using system resources
Users have reported that the URL sometimes redirects them to the older version of Time Doctor
ActivTrak Vs Time Doctor– Features Comparison
Time Tracking
ActivTrak offers automatic time tracking that provides detailed insights into employee work hours, categorizing time as productive, unproductive, or undefined. This feature enables businesses to understand work durations and trends for both remote and in-office employees, facilitating the identification of unbalanced workloads and time-wasting activities.
Thus, by capturing activity over time, rather than just at the start and end of the day, ActivTrak helps organizations spot patterns that may impact productivity.
On the other hand, Time Doctor simplifies time tracking with both interactive and automatic modes. In the interactive mode, employees can start and stop the timer according to their work hours, allowing them to manage tasks effectively. This form of time tracking is manual as it relies on users logging in, especially when compared to ActivTrak’s automatic tracking system.
However, Time Doctor also offers an automatic mode, which records activity without any sort of manual input. It also includes features like real-time task tracking and optional screenshots, enabling managers to monitor workflows and make quick decisions to enhance productivity.
Winner: Time Doctor wins this category as it offers both automatic and manual modes of time tracking whereas ActivTrak only offers automatic.
Employee Monitoring
ActivTrak offers a comprehensive employee monitoring solution designed to provide insights into workforce productivity while respecting employee privacy. The platform automatically collects application and website usage data, categorizing activities as productive or unproductive based on team roles or job functions.
This real-time visibility enables organizations to analyze work patterns, identify bottlenecks, and ensure compliance without intrusive measures like keystroke logging or video recording. Additionally, ActivTrak's customizable dashboards and reports facilitate data-driven decisions to enhance operational efficiency.
Meanwhile, Time Doctor provides employee monitoring tools aimed at enhancing productivity through detailed analytics. The software tracks time spent on tasks and projects, offering insights into employee performance. It also monitors website and application usage, allowing managers to proactively identify and address potential distractions.
The platform's real-time monitoring capabilities, such as screenshot capture and idle time detection, ensure that teams remain focused and efficient. It makes it effective in companies with remote environments where managers have to frequently monitor employee activity.
Winner: Time Doctor emerges as the winner due to offering more direct monitoring features such as screenshot capture. However, businesses looking for a more passive, less intrusive monitoring software may find themselves more comfortable with ActivTrak.
Analytics
ActivTrak provides a comprehensive suite of analytics tools designed to offer deep insights into workforce productivity and behavior. The platform features customizable dashboards that allow organizations to tailor data visualization to their specific needs, enabling at-a-glance summaries of performance and productivity trends. These dashboards can display metrics such as application and website usage, workload distribution, and team productivity levels.
On top of all this, ActivTrak offers detailed productivity reports that help identify work habits and patterns, facilitating data-driven decisions to enhance efficiency. Its analytics capabilities extend to real-time monitoring, allowing managers to analyze user activity as it happens, understand workflows, and address potential issues promptly.
Conversely, Time Doctor offers workforce analytics that are aimed at improving management and performance through real-time data. To this end, it provides insights into time spent on tasks, projects, and clients, allowing organizations to track productivity accurately. It also features web and application usage reports, enabling managers to identify potential distractions and optimize workflows.
Time Doctor's executive dashboard offers a high-level overview of team performance, facilitating strategic decision-making. Additionally, the platform includes attendance tracking, work scheduling, and payroll reporting features, streamlining administrative processes and ensuring accurate compensation.
Winner: This category ends in a tie as both software provide comparable analytic capabilities that are intended for different cases. ActivTrak focuses on workforce behavior analytics, making it a great fit for companies that prioritize process improvement. In contrast, Time Doctor has an emphasis on real-time workforce analytics, making it ideal for organizations that need to monitor work hours for accurate payroll.
Integrations
ActivTrak offers a strong set of integrations designed to enhance workforce analytics and productivity insights. Through its ActivConnect API, organizations can seamlessly integrate ActivTrak data with various business systems and Business Intelligence (BI) tools, enabling real-time insights and custom reporting. This integration facilitates data-driven decisions aimed at optimizing workforce productivity and performance.
Additionally, ActivTrak provides native integrations with platforms such as Microsoft Teams, Salesforce, and Google Calendar, allowing users to access productivity metrics directly within these applications.
Similarly, Time Doctor offers a wide array of integrations aimed at streamlining time tracking and project management across various platforms. The software integrates with numerous project management tools, including Asana, Trello, and monday. com, allowing users to track time spent on tasks directly within these applications.
Time Doctor also supports integrations with payment and invoicing platforms such as PayPal, Wise, and Gusto, facilitating seamless payroll processing. These integrations enable businesses to manage time tracking, project management, and payroll within a unified interface, enhancing operational efficiency and accuracy.
Winner: ActivTrak slightly edges out Time Doctor here as it offers an API that allows it to connect with various business systems.
Pricing
ActivTrak offers a tiered pricing structure to accommodate various organizational needs:
Free - $0/user/month
Essentials - $10/user/month
Essentials Plus - $15/user/month
Professional - $19/user/month
Essential features such as productivity reports and time tracking are included in all of the pricing tiers, including the free plan. However, higher price tiers offer more features, such as unlimited users, capacity planning, impact analysis, etc.
Similarly, Time Doctor provides four subscription plans, each available with monthly or annual billing options:
Basic - $8/user/month
Standard - $14/user/month
Premium - $20/user/month
Enterprise - Customized pricing
All pricing plans include automatic time tracking, timeline reports, and offline tracking. A 14-day free trial is available. The Standard and Premium plans offer additional features such as expanded integrations, leave and break tracking, and keyboard activity monitoring. The Enterprise tier provides professional support along with features tailored for larger organizations, such as guided implementation and onboarding.
Winner: In terms of pricing, ActivTrak appears to be the winner due to its free plan and lower-priced tiers overall.
Which One To Choose – ActivTrak Or Time Doctor?
By now, we can see that both ActivTrak and Time Doctor provide workforce analytics and productivity tracking solutions, but they cater to different business needs.
ActivTrak is well-suited for organizations that prioritize non-intrusive workforce insights, behavioral analytics, and productivity optimization, making it ideal for companies focused on data-driven decision-making and employee well-being.
Time Doctor, on the other hand, is a great fit for businesses that require granular time tracking, direct monitoring, and payroll integrations, making it particularly useful for remote teams, freelancers, and companies with billable hours.
Thus, the right choice depends on your organization's goals, monitoring preferences, and operational requirements. However, if neither software is what you’re looking for right now, consider alternatives such as Hubstaff Software or ResourceInn .
Sami Usman is a writer at Software Finder. He has a background in writing and is interested in crafting content that explains everything while being easy to understand. Sami believes in the power of storytelling and strives to create works that are both enjoyable and engaging. In his free time, Sami enjoys solitude or talking to friends, but not both at the same time.
