Clockify vs TimeCamp for UK Small Business: Which Time Tracker Is Worth Your Time?
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The Free Tiers, Settled
Most Clockify versus TimeCamp comparisons hedge on the free plans and tell you to go and check. Both are knowable, and the answer is the opposite of what usually gets written.
Clockify’s free plan is capped at five users, including the workspace owner. The cap arrived around April 2026, ending the unlimited-user offer it was famous for.
TimeCamp’s free plan has no user limit. Unlimited users, unlimited projects.
So the received wisdom — Clockify for a team on a budget, TimeCamp for a solo freelancer — has it backwards. On headcount alone, TimeCamp now has the more generous free tier, and Clockify is the one that starts charging at user six.
That is the headline. The complication is what each free plan actually lets you do, and there the answer flips again depending on whether you bill clients.
At a Glance
| Clockify | TimeCamp | |
|---|---|---|
| Free tier users | 5, including owner | Unlimited |
| Paid plans from (annual) | $3.99 (~£3.00) | $3.99 (~£3.00) |
| Currency | USD | USD |
| Automatic activity tracking | Not the core model | Core feature |
| Invoicing | Standard, $5.49 | Starter, $3.99 |
| Billable rates | Paid plans | Ultimate, $9.99 |
| Best for | Billing by the hour on a budget | Larger teams tracking time for free |
Both vendors price in US dollars, which matters and is covered below.
Free Tier: What You Actually Get
Clockify Free — Five Users
Within the five-user cap you get unlimited time tracking, timesheets (though you cannot lock them), the auto tracker, calendar, web, desktop and mobile apps, basic reports and team activity.
What moved behind a paywall, and the one that matters most: billable rates are a paid feature. If you bill clients by the hour, the thing you need is not in the free plan. Also paid-only: bulk edit, adding time for others, required fields, project templates, time estimates, breaks, export and sharing, and advanced reporting. Kiosk mode moved from free to paid in April 2026 as well.
Free accounts may carry Clockify branding, exports can be restricted or watermarked, and API access is limited.
So the earlier suspicion that “certain previously free features such as billable rate tracking have quietly moved to paid tiers” is not a rumour. It is confirmed, and it is the single most important thing about Clockify’s free plan.
TimeCamp Free — Unlimited Users
Unlimited users and projects, timesheets, GPS location tracking and two-factor authentication. Invoicing is not included — that starts at Starter.
One thing I could not pin down, and it bears directly on the usual recommendation. Whether automatic desktop tracking is included on the free plan is genuinely contested: one reputable source lists automatic time tracking across all plans including Free, another lists the free plan’s features without it and puts the AI tracker at Ultimate. Since “you get the flagship feature even on the free plan” is the main reason people are pointed at TimeCamp free, confirm this in a trial before relying on it. I am not going to assert it either way.
Free Tier Verdict
Team of two to five tracking time only, not billing: either works. Clockify fits inside its cap and has the cleaner interface.
Team of six or more: TimeCamp, and it is not close. Clockify will deactivate your sixth user.
Solo freelancer billing clients: neither free plan does what you need. Clockify withholds billable rates; TimeCamp withholds invoicing. You are paying either way, which is the thing most comparisons miss entirely.
What It Costs to Scale
Both price per user per month in US dollars. Sterling below is converted at roughly £1 = $1.33, the rate in late October 2026, and shown before VAT — add 20%.
Clockify
| Plan | Annual (USD) | ~GBP | Monthly (USD) | ~GBP |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | $3.99 | £3.00 | $4.99 | £3.75 |
| Standard | $5.49 | £4.13 | $6.99 | £5.26 |
| Pro | $7.99 | £6.01 | $9.99 | £7.51 |
| Enterprise | $11.99 | £9.02 | $14.99 | £11.27 |
TimeCamp
| Plan | Annual (USD) | ~GBP | Monthly (USD) | ~GBP |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | $3.99 | £3.00 | $5.49 | £4.13 |
| Premium | $6.99 | £5.26 | $9.99 | £7.51 |
| Ultimate | $9.99 | £7.51 | $13.99 | £10.52 |
On the Currency, Which Is Usually Got Wrong
These are dollar prices. Quoting Clockify at “£3.99 per seat” or TimeCamp at “£2.99 to £3.49” treats a dollar figure as a sterling one and overstates the cost by about a third. A dollar price converts to a smaller pound figure.
What does add to your bill is VAT at 20%, after conversion. So Clockify Basic is about £3.00, or £3.60 including VAT — not £3.99.
The five-staff calculation follows from that. Five seats on Clockify Basic annual is roughly £180 a year before VAT, £216 with it — not the “nearly £300” you get by starting from the wrong currency.
The Feature You Need Changes the Answer
Entry tiers are identical: $3.99 annual on both. The comparison is decided a tier or two up, by which features you need.
Invoicing: TimeCamp wins. It is on Starter at $3.99. Clockify puts it on Standard at $5.49.
Billable rates: Clockify wins, decisively. Both sources I checked put TimeCamp’s billing rates on Ultimate at $9.99, with Premium at $6.99 lacking them. Clockify’s sit lower in the range.
Both together, which is what an hourly biller needs: Clockify Standard at $5.49 (about £4.13, or £4.95 with VAT) against TimeCamp Ultimate at $9.99 (about £7.51, or £9.01 with VAT). Clockify is roughly half the price for the combination.
So “TimeCamp edges it on per-seat cost” holds only at the entry tier, where they are level anyway. For a freelancer billing by the hour, Clockify is substantially cheaper.
Automatic vs Manual Tracking
Clockify: Manual by Design
Start a timer, assign it to a project, stop it. Add time after the fact if you forget. Clean and simple, and it depends on you remembering.
The honest limitation: if you context-switch constantly between calls, email and admin, the timer gets forgotten and the data stops being trustworthy.
TimeCamp: Built Around Automatic Capture
TimeCamp’s desktop app runs in the background logging which applications and websites you use, which you then assign to projects. The premise is that you should not have to remember.
For a sole trader tracking their own time, that is a genuine advantage and carries no complications — monitoring yourself raises no legal issue.
One claim worth tempering. Automatic records are sometimes presented as more defensible to HMRC than manual ones. HMRC has no view on time-tracking methodology; what it expects is accurate, complete business records kept for the required period. An automatic log may well be more accurate, which is a real argument. It is not a compliance advantage, and it is not what makes a claim stand up.
Monitoring Staff: What UK Law Actually Requires
The moment automatic activity tracking is pointed at an employee rather than yourself, this becomes a data protection exercise. The usual treatment — “tell your staff and put it in a policy” — is well short of the current position.
The ICO’s guidance on monitoring workers sets out what is expected. In outline:
- Define a clear purpose, and use the least intrusive method that achieves it. Monitoring must be necessary for the stated purpose, not merely useful.
- Identify a lawful basis from the six under UK GDPR, and a separate condition if you process special category data.
- Carry out a DPIA before any monitoring likely to be high risk to workers — monitoring of messages and email is given as an example. The ICO recommends a DPIA for all monitoring regardless of risk level, and if you decide against one, document why.
- Tell workers the nature, extent and rationale of the monitoring, in accessible and understandable language, in your privacy information — not buried in a contract clause.
- Keep only relevant data and delete what you do not need.
- Disclose monitoring data in response to a subject access request. An employee can ask for their activity logs and you must provide them, within one month, extendable by two for complex requests.
- Have a contract with the tool provider, which is your processor, and satisfy yourself it is compliant.
- Apply international transfer rules if worker data leaves the UK — relevant here, since neither vendor is UK-based.
Note too that since 19 June 2026 the Data (Use and Access) Act 2025 requires a data protection complaints procedure: an accessible route to complain, acknowledgement within 30 days, and a prominent link from your privacy notice. If you monitor staff, expect that route to be used.
Workers can also object to monitoring where you rely on legitimate interests, which you then have to deal with rather than ignore.
None of this makes activity monitoring unlawful. It does mean that switching it on for employees is a project with documentation attached, not a settings toggle — and that is the real cost of TimeCamp’s flagship feature in a team context. Take advice if you are unsure.
Invoicing from Tracked Time
Neither tool is accounting software, and neither handles VAT returns or MTD filing.
Clockify generates invoices from tracked time on Standard and above, with billable rates per project or client, PDF export, and integrations with Xero, QuickBooks and FreeAgent.
TimeCamp has invoicing from Starter, though billing rates sit at Ultimate — so cheap invoicing with rate-based billing locked higher is an awkward combination for an hourly biller.
For a UK sole trader either will produce a straightforward invoice. If your billing involves multiple VAT rates, CIS deductions or recurring subscriptions, use proper accounting software and treat time tracking as a feeder.
Worth knowing: MTD for Income Tax has applied since 6 April 2026 to sole traders and landlords with more than £50,000 of qualifying income, measured on gross income, falling to £30,000 in April 2027 and £20,000 in April 2028. In scope you file quarterly by 7 August, 7 November, 7 February and 7 May, then a Final Declaration by 31 January. If you bill by the hour, that makes the time-to-invoice-to-accounts handoff a quarterly concern. Our FreeAgent review and MTD for VAT against MTD for Income Tax cover that end.
Reporting
Clockify gives clean visual reports by project, client or team member, with scheduled reports and exports on paid plans and basic summaries on free. Approachable, and good enough to send a client.
TimeCamp adds productivity analysis from its activity data — not just how long on a project, but whether the time was focused or fragmented. Genuinely useful for understanding your own habits. Pointed at staff, it is monitoring, with everything above attached.
Which Should You Choose?
Clockify if
- You bill clients by the hour — Standard at $5.49 covers invoicing and billable rates for about half TimeCamp’s equivalent
- Your team is five or fewer and you want a capable free tier
- You prefer manual tracking and your team is disciplined about it
- You want the simpler interface
TimeCamp if
- You have six or more people and want to track time without paying — its free tier has no user cap
- You want automatic capture rather than relying on timers, as a sole trader
- Productivity insight matters to you as much as billable totals
- You need cheap invoicing without rate-based billing, where Starter at $3.99 undercuts Clockify
For a solo freelancer
Trial both, but know that neither free plan supports billing properly — Clockify withholds billable rates, TimeCamp withholds invoicing. Budget for a paid tier from the start, and on that basis Clockify Standard is the cheaper route to a working setup.
FAQ
Is Clockify’s free plan still unlimited?
No. It is capped at five users including the owner, from around April 2026. Billable rates and kiosk mode also moved to paid plans.
How many users does TimeCamp’s free plan allow?
Unlimited, on both sources I could verify. That makes it the more generous free tier on headcount, contrary to the common framing.
Which is cheaper?
Entry tiers are identical at $3.99 per user per month annually. Above that it depends on features: TimeCamp is cheaper for invoicing alone, Clockify substantially cheaper for invoicing plus billable rates.
Are these prices in pounds?
No — both price in US dollars, so the sterling cost is lower than the number suggests, then VAT adds 20%. Clockify Basic is about £3.00, or £3.60 with VAT.
Does TimeCamp’s free plan include automatic tracking?
Sources disagree, and I could not resolve it. Verify in a trial before choosing TimeCamp free for that reason specifically.
Do I need to tell staff I am tracking their activity?
Yes, and considerably more than that. You need a lawful basis, a clear purpose and the least intrusive method, worker-facing privacy information covering the nature, extent and rationale, very likely a DPIA, a processor contract with the vendor, and the ability to hand over an employee’s monitoring data if they make a subject access request.
Can staff ask to see their own monitoring data?
Yes, through a subject access request, answerable within one month and extendable by two for complex requests.
Does either handle Making Tax Digital?
No. Both are time trackers. They integrate with accounting software that files.
The Bottom Line
The usual verdict on these two needs reversing in two places.
On free tiers: TimeCamp is now the generous one, with no user cap, while Clockify stops at five. If a free plan for a team is why you are looking, that is the answer.
On cost for an hourly biller: Clockify is cheaper, not TimeCamp. Entry prices are level at $3.99, but the combination a freelancer needs — invoicing with billable rates — is $5.49 on Clockify against $9.99 on TimeCamp.
And the point neither free plan survives: if you bill by the hour, neither free tier does the job. Clockify holds back billable rates, TimeCamp holds back invoicing. Plan on paying.
TimeCamp’s automatic tracking remains its real differentiator, and for a sole trader watching their own day it is the better tool. Turn it on your staff and you have taken on a data protection project — purpose, lawful basis, DPIA, privacy information, and subject access requests that now include activity logs.
Our Clockify pricing guide breaks down every tier, and if you are weighing a third option our Clockify and Harvest comparison covers the agency end. For the workflow around whichever you pick, see tracking billable hours as a UK freelancer.
Pricing and features correct at time of writing, in US dollars; sterling figures are illustrative conversions at $1.33 and exclude VAT unless stated. Both vendors change plans regularly, and Clockify changed its free plan in April 2026 — confirm current details before purchasing. This article is general information about UK data protection and tax obligations, not legal or tax advice; take advice before monitoring employees and confirm your MTD position with HMRC or a qualified adviser.
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