Honest Review:

Apploye

• Clean and simple user interface
• Variety of well-curated features
• Responsive customer support
• Excellent for monitoring and improving productivity
• Reasonable pricing

Apploye offers two different pricing plans, with the option to pay monthly or at discounted prices annually. Aside from those, they also offer custom prices for enterprise-level plans and a 10-day free trial. Let’s take a closer look at what the plans have to offer.

Apploye Standard Plan 

The Apploye Standard Plan is the first and most affordable tier among the pricing options and is designed with a focus on time tracking. It costs $2.5 per user per month when paid yearly, or $5 if paid monthly.

For time tracking, Apploye has online and offline time tracking, manual time entry, timesheets with daily, weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, and custom views, timesheet approval, time entry notes, and weekly time limit. It also comes with a Pomodoro timer and the ability to track time on projects & tasks and delete timesheets. Users can also track time using a Chrome extension.

With Apploye, task management is facilitated with task-wise time logs, project-wise and assignee-wise views, and the ability to create and assign tasks. Employees can be monitored with a real-time view of who is active and the ability to see their latest timer start times. Projects and budgets can be managed using task management, project management, project budget, and billing, project budget alerts, project hourly and fixed fee billing, project progress reports and cost graphs, and the ability to assign project manager roles and to keep track of projects based on the client.

Client relations and invoicing are facilitated on this Apploye plan, with the ability to create, archive, edit, and delete client profiles, active and archive views, and assign projects to specific clients. It also offers invoicing for fixed fee projects or hours worked, invoicing for selling services or products, status-wise summary views, quick action-editing, closing, and deleting invoices, tax and discounts, preview of invoice drafts before sending, and the ability to download and print invoices or send them via email.

Reporting-wise, this Apploye plan allows users to see data in graph, tabular, personal, and weekly timesheet views, along with weekly organizational overviews. It also allows visibility into top assigned projects, ongoing tasks, total weekly work hours, team members’ ranking according to time logged, and the project with the most hours logged. It also shows daily time logged and manual time entries, and reports can be customized to only display specific date ranges.

Apploye team and admin features on this plan include organization customization, the addition of multiple organizations, single and multiple admin access, team manager access, activity settings, manual time settings, user profile settings, plan management, and the ability to create teams and departments. Payroll is facilitated with the ability to invite, remove, and set pay rates and bill rates for members, as well as edit member profiles. It also allows users to send fixed payments or pay based on hourly pay rates, view payment histories, and access project, assignee, and date-wise views.

Employees can be monitored remotely on this Apploye plan with optional screenshots that can be set to capture at specific intervals, app and URL usage tracking, activity and engagement analytics, desktop monitoring, and the ability to delete screenshots, disable screenshot deletion permissions, and turn individual member tracking on and off. Apploye also offers employee GPS location monitoring, time tracking based on job location, project-wise and member-wise location views, location notes, and Google Maps views.

Using the Apploye desktop app, users on this tier can track time automatically, launch at startup, create and complete tasks, use dark mode, specify message alert tones, and effect organizational changes on Windows, macOS, and Linux. The mobile app can be used on Android and iOS to track time on projects and tasks. Supported integrations are Trello, ClickUp, and Asana.

Apploye Elite Plan

The Apploye Elite Plan is designed for remote and hybrid work and has all of the features of the Standard Plan for only a dollar more at only $3.5 per user per month when paying yearly, or $7 when paying monthly. Aside from all of the features in the previous plan, this tier offers more — it contains the complete arsenal of Apploye features.

With the Apploye Elite plan, businesses can add idle detection to their time tracking features, real-time screenshots, permission for real-time screenshots, and the ability to take silent screenshots in their employee monitoring suite. Reporting is enhanced with team members ranking on activities, average activity analytics during the week, and the ability to see the project with the most activity and daily average activity.

Users on the desktop version of Apploye can enjoy idle time management and screenshot alerts, while those on mobile can finally experience GPS tracking — because GPS tracking for field employees is only available with this plan.

The entire suite of features for GPS tracking consists of employee GPS location monitoring, project and member-wise location views, Google Map view, location notes, and the ability to restrict clocking in only on the job location. Users can also enjoy remote tracking and employee monitoring with optional screenshots, app usage and URL usage tracking, desktop monitoring, activity and engagement analytics, along with the ability to set screenshot frequency, delete screenshots, disable screenshot delete permission, and turn time tracking for individual members on or off.

Upcoming Features

Aside from the features mentioned in the Elite and Standard Plans, Apploye has also announced two new feature suites to make it even more powerful, namely schedules and attendance and leaves.

The announced Apploye scheduling features are project and member-wise views, daily, weekly, monthly, and task-wise schedules, schedule notifications, Google Calendar-like schedule view, and repeating schedules. Meanwhile, the ability to create shifts and set durations, edit and delete shifts, apply for leaves and leave notes, and accept or decline leaves are announced for the attendance and leave management suite, along with date and member-wise views, daily and early color-coded summaries, color-coded attendance statuses, and leave types.

1. Time Tracking

Time tracking using a digital solution is an important aspect of the modern workplace. It eliminates the need for messy and error-prone paper-based systems, streamlines and speeds up the process, and saves businesses money along the way. Apploye provides two options for time tracking, namely manual and automatic.

Manual time tracking allows users to enter their worked hours directly into their Apploye timesheets by simply adding starting times and durations on the days that they worked. They can even add notes for these entries that document important aspects of the shift, such as when they use the feature because they forgot to turn on the timer for previous shifts. Aside from that, they can also log time specifically on tasks by indicating it in their time entries.

Automatic time tracking allows them to capture their hours more accurately using start-and-stop timers that they can toggle on upon starting a shift and toggle off upon completion. Like the previous option, users can also track time against specific tasks by indicating what task they’re tracking time for in the session upon starting. When using the automatic timer on mobile, Apploye also tracks GPS location to ensure that team members are logging attendance from geofenced areas.

What I love about Apploye’s automatic time tracking is that it doesn’t make users jump through hoops during the clock-in process, thanks to its one-click functionality. Best of all, single-click time tracking — and all other time tracking options — are available on both desktop and mobile, allowing users to go wherever work takes them… or take their work wherever life leads them.

Now, the data captured by users through the previously discussed options is automatically populated into timesheets that give businesses insights into how time is spent across certain periods using daily, weekly, biweekly, monthly, and custom range views. These timesheets can be reviewed for approval on a daily, weekly, or custom basis. Admins can identify idle time and remove them from the timesheets to better reflect actual hours spent on work.

Once reviewed and approved, the data in the timesheets becomes the basis from which the payroll for employees and invoicing for clients, so it’s important to ensure that the data is accurate. For more granular control over invoicing, Apploye gives users the power to include or remove specific projects and their hours from invoice calculations. The timesheets can be exported for sharing or further processing in PDF, CSV, or XLSX formats.

But aside from all of these, one little feature that I love the most is the Pomodoro timer, which is designed to help employees maintain a good balance between work and rest by allowing them to set timers and reminders for when to stop working, when to rest, and for how long. During their rest periods throughout the day, they can refresh themselves with helpful activities, naps, snacks, and more, so they can return to work with clear minds and reinvigorated bodies.

2. Attendance, Shift, and Leave Management

Managing attendance, shifts, and leaves to ensure that employees are utilized to their full potential while getting the time off they need is no easy feat, especially with traditional systems that require managers to jump from spreadsheet to spreadsheet, deal with constant calls, requests, verbal notices, and other messy stuff that makes the process a total nightmare. With Apploye, employers can manage shifts and leaves using only one tool that simplifies and shortens all these processes.

Using Apploye, managers can create shifts and set their durations for individual employees or entire teams. They can also edit the members, timing, and duration of any shift, or delete them completely as business requirements change.

Team members can easily clock in and out of their shifts using the Apploye desktop and mobile apps, as discussed in the previous section, and managers can review their attendance at the end of the day using the daily summary that details their attendance status all in one place. Color-coded status indicators show if they are on time, late, absent, or on leave. Managers can also check if the actual hours of the day match individual employees’ required hours and the exact times of their clock-in and clock-outs.

Shifts and attendances can be viewed date-wise or member-wise for any specific period, allowing managers to filter out information as needed. To facilitate monthly evaluations, Apploye also allows managers to generate monthly reports where they can view all shifts, attendance, and absences, all in one place. They can even choose to see a color-coded annual summary that shows attendance statuses throughout the year.

For time off, members can request full-day or half-day leaves directly from the Apploye dashboard and even leave notes detailing the reasons for their request. Managers can then review these requests with a member-wise view showing the selected dates, leave types, and notes. Once decided on, managers can see the approval status of leave requests in the accepted and declined view for better management. No more chasing papers, signatures, and other things that make the process awkward and slow!

3. Project, Task, and Budget Management

Setting up a time tracking and attendance system is one thing, but managing projects, tasks, and budgets is a whole other game… for outdated analog systems. Thankfully, Apploye allows businesses to do all of that (and more!) using only one tool with powerful and convenient multifunctionality.

Using Apploye, managers can create projects, chop them up into smaller tasks for easier monitoring and more realistic completion, and then assign them to team members according to their capacities and availability. Members can be added to the project, and their roles, level of access, and permissions can be assigned upon initiation or modified at any time during the process.

Start dates and deadlines can be set up according to project needs to ensure that everything is completed and delivered at the right time. As they move along, users can set any project as in progress, completed, or archived with ease. They can also view how the total budget, spent hours, and remaining budgets stand using the project summary at a glance or in detail with the exportable project progress report graph. For concise and structured views, Apploye offers separate views for active, budgeted, and archived projects, which also allows managers to edit project details at any time during the process.

Setting up project budgets helps businesses stay on track by giving visibility on progress and allowing them to track progress against cost. These help ensure that projects remain healthy and profitable. To help keep projects in line, Apploye can be configured to send email notifications when certain budget thresholds are met.

Billing can be easily customized for both fixed and hourly options to ensure that clients are being charged the right amount for the products and services they receive. Adding client profiles to the projects will ensure that the automatically generated invoices are sent to the correct receivers at all times. As changes happen, these client profiles can be modified, archived, or deleted completely.

All of these features work together to ensure that Apploye users can worry less about how projects are managed so they can focus their energies on actually working on them instead.

4. RemoteTrack Staff Monitoring System

Apploye understands the value of utilizing business resources properly, so they’ve come up with the RemoteTrack Staff Monitoring System to help protect businesses from time theft even if employees are working off-site.

Essentially, the Apploye RemoteTrack is a system that captures and analyzes employee computer activity when they’re clocked in. This is done through productivity tracking ratios based on keyboard and mouse movement, expressed in percentages, and classified as either active, neutral, or idle.

With the RemoteTrack system, Apploye also captures screenshots of clocked-in employees’ screens randomly within 10-minute timeframes to give managers visibility into what they’re currently working on. The screenshots can even be taken instantly at will. On the employees’ end, they can add notes to screenshots to explain what they’re working on or delete them along with the 10-minute time entry they are related to.

Aside from screenshotting, Apploye also records the URLs and apps that employees use when they’re clocked in to give managers insight into their working habits. This can help identify and correct detrimental behaviors that affect productivity and cost businesses money.

Now, while these sound really good from the business owners’ and managers’ end, employees may not share the sentiment. Screenshots and URL and app usage recordings may feel intrusive into their privacy and may compromise their personal security by broadcasting certain parts of their computer usage habits that are not meant for sharing with others, such as personal emails. I personally believe that personal life should never be mixed with work, but modern arrangements such as work-from-home setups can blur the line. So while RemoteTrack may feel quite invasive, it may also help and inspire employees to create better compartmentalization measures, which will affect everyone involved positively in the long run.

(As of December 2023)

• Capterra: 4.9/5
• G2: 4.5/5
• Software Advice: 5/5
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• CrozDesk: 4.3/5
• App Store: 4/5

It’s not very often that I’d hail a time tracking software as a comprehensive solution, and Apploye is one of the very few. As an owner of a time tracking solution myself, I have a very clear vision of what makes such software great, and Apploye hits all the right points.

The feature arsenal offered by Apploye is respectable in terms of variety and functionality. The developers put a lot of thought into what they’re offering, and they’ve carefully designed their product with the end user in mind. This is evident in their clean and clutter-free interface, ease of use, and the low learning curve required to master the app. The automations also make work easier for users, as it allows them to entrust the more repetitive aspects of work to the software, such as sending budget threshold alerts, so that time is spent on the things that actually matter.

The time tracking options offered by Apploye are fuss-free and very straightforward. Both manual entry and once-click timers are painless, reliable, and easily adaptable to existing workflows. — it might even be better than your current practices! And because the software is available for use on most devices, be it on desktop or mobile, users can take work wherever they go, or go wherever work takes them without worrying about how to track their hours.

The attendance, shift, and management features offer a better alternative to paper-based systems when it comes to utilizing your workforce and processing time off. What used to be very complicated processes were transformed by Apploye into highly streamlined processes that do not require chasing after signatures, negotiating over the phone, and other similarly unintuitive and awkward situations.

With Apploye, project and budget management becomes a breeze with features that work together to ensure that projects progress as intended, accountability is maintained, budgets and time are utilized efficiently, and everyone on the team knows what’s happening. Furthermore, the customizability of the features for managing projects and budgets allows businesses to be flexible when facing dynamic changes. All of these work together to ensure that projects remain healthy and profitable at all times.

And because businesses can potentially lose money on time theft via dishonest work, Apploye’s RemoteTrack staff monitoring features are a great way to inculcate the values of accountability and honest work among the ranks. It captures users’ computer activity through screenshots, URLs and app usage recordings, and productivity measurement based on mouse and keyboard activity while clocked in. This gives managers visibility into their teams’ computer usage habits and allows them to catch problematic trends before they become too late to correct.

But despite all these high praises, Apploye does come with a few downsides. First and most important for me is the lackluster reporting features. Insightful reports are the backbone of good business decisions, so a time tracking solution must provide a robust suite of features for reporting. Currently, Apploye lacks the power and precision that I’m used to but I’ve heard that they’re working on it, so all we have to do now is wait.

And speaking of waiting, it’s been a while since they last gave updates regarding the announced additional feature suites for scheduling and leave management. I wonder what’s taking them so long? But aside from the missing features, some of the current ones also need a bit of polishing and fine-tuning to improve reliability and usability, particularly for mobile apps — nobody likes bugs and glitches.

The limited integrations and lack of dashboard customization options also present another area of concern, but they’re not quite deal breakers. But what may constitute a dealbreaker for Apploye is the privacy threat posed by the RemoteTrack features, which may cause friction between employees and managers for being perceived as invasive, especially for those working from home or whose personal and professional lives don’t have a certain degree of compartmentalization.

But on to the bright side: Apploye is very affordably priced, and I truly love the concern that they’ve shown for users’ wellness through the Pomodoro timer.

Now, listen. If you’re in the market for a reliable time tracker with a wealth of features for a low price, I’d highly encourage you to give Apploye a try. Getting a 10-day trial is easy and free through their official website, so head over there right now and see if my assessment will match your experience!