Best Time Clock Software for Employee Scheduling

Website: https://www.joinhomebase.com/

Best for: Single-location hourly teams

Starting price: $24 per location/month (billed annually)

Free plan: Yes

Pros: Free plan for one location with up to 10 employees; Pricing per location, so adding staff does not raise the bill

Cons: GPS and geofenced clock-in need the Essentials plan; Payroll is a separate add-on at every tier

Homebase combines scheduling, a time clock, team messaging, hiring, and a payroll add-on in one app built for hourly, shift-based teams. The Basic plan costs nothing and covers one location with up to 10 employees, with basic scheduling, time tracking, team messaging, and POS connections. That suits a cafe, salon, shop, or clinic that wants the schedule and the clock in one place at no monthly charge.

Essentials costs $24 per location per month billed annually, or $30 billed monthly, and adds GPS time tracking, geofencing, and late arrival alerts. Plus costs $56 per location per month billed annually and adds PTO tracking and labor cost forecasting, while All-in-One costs $96 and adds hiring, onboarding, and HR tools. Because the price is per location rather than per person, a busy single site with 30 or 40 staff can cost far less than a per-user tool at the same headcount

Website: https://www.deputy.com/

Best for: Multi-site teams that need labor rules

Starting price: $5 per user/month (billed annually)

Free plan: Free trial (31 days)

Pros: Strong labor law compliance and award interpretation tools; Auto-scheduling and demand forecasting on higher tiers

Cons: No free plan; Monthly plans carry a $30 minimum monthly spend per invoice

Deputy is a scheduling and time tracking tool built for teams that work across several locations and need to stay inside labor rules. Lite costs $5 per user per month billed annually, or $5.50 billed monthly, and includes basic scheduling, basic timesheets, basic time clocking, labor law compliance, shift swaps, and leave management. Core costs $6.50 per user per month billed annually and adds auto-scheduling, demand forecasting, wage and labor budgets, timesheet auto approval, and biometric clocking. Pro costs $9 and adds custom access levels, location hierarchies, pay centers, and single sign-on.

Every user counts toward the bill, including owners, managers, and supervisors, so a 25-person team on Lite costs $125 per month billed annually before add-ons. HR, messaging, analytics, and payroll are separate add-ons, so the headline price can rise as you add extras. Deputy offers a free trial of up to 31 days with no credit card required.

Website: https://wheniwork.com/

Best for: Low-cost scheduling for hourly teams

Starting price: $2.50 per user/month

Free plan: Free trial (14 days)

Pros: Lowest headline price in this list at $2.50 per user per month; Simple drag-and-drop scheduling with shift swaps and team messaging

Cons: Time tracking is a separate add-on on some plan views; No free plan, only a 14-day trial

When I Work is a scheduling, time clock, and messaging app for hourly teams in retail, restaurants, and services. Essentials costs $2.50 per user per month and covers scheduling, auto scheduling, multi-week and multi-location scheduling, shift swaps, and payroll and POS integrations. Pro costs $5 per user per month and adds scheduling rules, role permissions, and labor sharing, while Premium costs $8 and adds API access, webhooks, and SAML single sign-on. There is a 14-day free trial with no credit card required, and no free plan.

The price to watch is the time tracking add-on. On some views of the pricing page, time tracking and attendance adds $1.50 per user per month on Essentials and $2 on Pro and Premium, which lifts Essentials with time tracking to $4 per user per month. Other views show time and attendance included in every plan, so confirm which version applies to your account before you budget. Even at $4 per user per month, a 25-person team costs $100 per month.

Website: https://www.7shifts.com/

Best for: Restaurants that schedule by sales

Starting price: $39.99 per location/month (billed annually)

Free plan: Yes

Pros: Free Comp plan for one location with up to 15 employees; POS integrations that feed sales data into labor forecasting

Cons: Built only for restaurants; The free Comp plan has no time clock

7shifts is a restaurant workforce platform that covers scheduling, time clocking, team communication, tip management, and payroll, with deep links to restaurant POS systems such as Toast, Square, and Clover. The Comp plan is free for one location with up to 15 employees and includes basic scheduling, availability and time-off requests, and one-way announcements. Essentials costs $39.99 per location per month billed annually, or $44.99 billed monthly, for up to 30 employees, and adds advanced scheduling, team messaging, and basic time clocking. Pro costs $79.99 billed annually for up to 60 employees and adds PTO accruals, labor compliance tools, and advanced time clocking. Premium costs $134.99 billed annually with unlimited employees and adds tip management, task management, and training.

The POS link is the feature that sets 7shifts apart. Sales data flows into labor forecasting, so a manager can schedule to expected covers rather than guessing from last week. Payroll costs $39.99 per location per month plus $6 per employee, for eligible United States accounts only. Because pricing is per location with a headcount cap on each tier, a single busy restaurant with many part-time staff can cost less than on a per-user tool

Website: https://www.connecteam.com/

Best for: Deskless teams that want one app

Starting price: $29 per hub/month (billed annually)

Free plan: Yes

Pros: Free Small Business plan for up to 10 users across all hubs; Flat monthly price covers the first 30 users on each hub

Cons: Each hub is sold separately, so using all three hubs triples the base price; The free plan allows only one time clock and one job schedule

Connecteam is an all-in-one workforce app for deskless and hourly teams, sold as three hubs: Operations, Communications, and HR and Skills. The time clock and scheduling live in the Operations hub. The Small Business plan is free for life for up to 10 users and includes features from all hubs, with limits of one time clock and one job schedule. Basic costs $29 per hub per month billed annually, or $35 billed monthly, for the first 30 users, then $0.80 per extra user per month on Operations. Advanced costs $49 billed annually and adds geofencing, auto clock-out, and scheduled messages, while Expert costs $99 and adds breadcrumb GPS tracking, auto-assign shifts, and API access.

The flat-rate shape is the key point to grasp. A 30-person team on Operations Basic costs $29 per month billed annually, which works out to under $1 per user, while a 31st user adds only $0.80 per month on that tier. The catch is the hub model: a team that wants Operations, Communications, and HR and Skills on Basic pays $29 per hub, or $87 per month in total for the first 30 users. A 14-day free trial of the Expert plan is available with no credit card required.

Website: https://buddypunch.com/

Best for: Stopping buddy punching with photo checks

Starting price: $19 per month plus $4.99 per user/month (billed annually)

Free plan: Free trial (14 days)

Pros: Photo capture, facial recognition, and GPS on punches; Administrators are free and unlimited

Cons: A $19 monthly base fee makes it costly for very small teams; Scheduling costs extra on Starter

Buddy Punch is a time clock built around one problem: making sure the person clocking in is the employee who is actually at work. Starter costs $4.99 per user per month billed annually, or $5.99 billed monthly, plus a $19 monthly base fee, and includes GPS on punches, mobile apps, time off, alerts, job tracking, payroll integrations, and reports. Pro costs $6.99 per user per month billed annually plus the $19 base fee and adds offline mode, basic geofencing, QR and PIN kiosk punching, webcam photos, break compliance, and scheduling. Advanced costs $12.99 plus the base fee and adds advanced reporting, single sign-on, manager permissions, and real-time GPS.

The verification menu is the reason to choose Buddy Punch. Photo capture and facial recognition attach to each punch, geofencing blocks clock-ins from outside the job site, and QR codes let a kiosk at the door handle clock-ins for staff without phones. The $19 base fee means three people pay $33.97 per month on Starter billed annually, while 30 people pay $168.70 per month. There is no free plan, only a 14-day free trial.

Website: https://quickbooks.intuit.com/

Best for: Teams already running QuickBooks

Starting price: $20 per month plus $10 per user/month

Free plan: Free trial (30 days)

Pros: Hours flow straight into QuickBooks payroll and invoicing without a separate integration; GPS-stamped mobile clock-in with geofencing on Elite

Cons: Requires a QuickBooks Online subscription on top of the Time price; Premium has no geofencing

QuickBooks Time, formerly TSheets, is the time tracking and scheduling tool from Intuit, built to sit inside the QuickBooks system. Time Premium costs $20 per month as a base fee plus $10 per user per month, and Time Elite costs $40 per month plus $12 per user per month. Both base fees include one admin, and both plans include a 30-day free trial with no free plan. Intuit raised the per-user price by $2 on July 1, 2026, from $8 to $10 on Premium and from $10 to $12 on Elite, while the base fees stayed at $20 and $40.

The main draw is the link to QuickBooks. Hours tracked in the app flow into QuickBooks payroll and invoicing without a CSV export or a third-party integration to maintain, which saves admin time every pay run. The catch is the stacked cost: QuickBooks Time requires an active QuickBooks Online subscription, from around $38 per month, so a 10-person team on Premium costs $120 per month for Time plus the subscription.

Website: https://clockify.me/

Best for: Small teams that want a free time clock

Starting price: $3.99 per seat/month (billed annually)

Free plan: Yes

Pros: Free plan for up to 5 users with unlimited tracking; Works on web, desktop, mobile, and browser extensions

Cons: The free plan lost billable rates, CSV export, and kiosk entry in April 2026; The sixth user means buying a seat for everyone

Clockify is a timer, timesheet, and time tracking tool from CAKE.com, and it is the cheapest way in this list to put a small team on a shared tracker. The Free plan costs nothing for up to 5 users, including the owner, with unlimited tracking, timer, timesheet, calendar, auto tracker, reports, and apps. Basic costs $3.99 per seat per month billed annually, or $4.99 billed monthly, and adds billable rates, CSV and Excel export, shared reports, private projects, kiosk entry, and adding time for others. Standard costs $5.49 billed annually and adds invoicing, time off, and approvals. Pro costs $7.99 and adds activity monitoring and scheduling, while Enterprise costs $11.99.

The free plan changed in April 2026, when CAKE.com capped it at 5 users and moved billable rates, spreadsheet exports, shared reports, and kiosk entry to the higher tiers, with reports limited to 31 days at a time. That still leaves a useful free tracker for a team of five or fewer that only needs to log hours. Note that the free allowance ends when a workspace upgrades: a team of six buys six seats, not one, so the jump from $0 to $23.94 per month on Basic is a real step.