Time Tracking for Your Business

Time Tracking for Software Developers

You don’t forget to do the work - you forget to log it. Sandtime.io makes it fast to start a timer and easy to fill in what you missed, so your Friday isn’t a memory exercise and your client invoice reflects what you actually built. Now you can log time straight from Claude Code, Codex, or any MCP client.

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Software Developers: why they choose Sandtime.io

Track by project and ticket

Start a timer on any project or tag an entry to a specific ticket. Every hour lands in the right bucket, not in a pile to sort at invoice time.

Log what you already did

Opened Sandtime.io at 4pm? Fill in the morning retroactively. No timer needed - just set the time range and you’re done.

Log from Claude Code and Codex

Connect Sandtime.io over the MCP server and create time entries from your editor and terminal - the context is already in your commits and your diff.

See where your hours go

Reports by project, client, or ticket type. Know whether your estimate held up before the invoice goes out.

How a developer sets up Sandtime.io around the editor

A developer sets up Sandtime.io with one project per client or codebase and notes the ticket on each entry, logged from a timer, after the fact, or by an AI assistant over the MCP server. At the end of a sprint or billing month, a report grouped by project shows where the hours went and whether the estimate held.

  1. One project per client or codebaseCreate a project for each client or product and mark client work billable. Put the ticket number in each entry’s note, so every hour says which piece of work it belongs to.
  2. Connect your toolsConnect the MCP server to Claude Code or Cursor so the assistant can create entries from your commits and pull requests, and generate a personal API key for your own scripts. The Chrome extension and Slack slash commands cover the rest.
  3. Track deep work without watching a clockStart a timer when you pick up a ticket, or skip it and fill in the morning afterwards with a start and end time. Check what the assistant logged, and overlap detection flags any entries that collide.
  4. Close the sprint with a reportGroup a custom report by project and by year-month-day to see each day’s hours, then export to Excel or CSV for the client invoice or the sprint review. With a revenue rate on the project, the Invoices template adds the totals.

Step by step in the help center: invite the team with the right role, approve a week from the email, and turn on auto-locking.

Start logging from your editorFree for unlimited users. No credit card required.

Common use cases

  • Track time per project and ticket without changing how you work
  • Fill in missed entries after a deep debugging session or code review
  • Track client work and internal work in one account
  • Generate an accurate billing summary for freelance or agency work
  • Review time across projects to understand where your capacity goes
  • Create time entries from your editor with Claude Code, Codex, or any MCP client

Key features

One-click timers

Hit start on a project and stop when you surface. No forms, no friction, no reason to put it off.

Retroactive time entry

Log a session after the fact with a start time, end time, and a note. Works for the sessions where a timer was never the right tool.

MCP integration

Create time entries from commits and your IDE without switching context, over an MCP server that is free for everyone.

Reports by project

Filter hours by project, client, or ticket type. Export for invoicing or sprint reviews.

Where Sandtime.io stops

Better to know before you invite the team. These are the gaps people in this line of work ask about most.

  • No invoicingSandtime.io does not send invoices. The Invoices report template lists time, rate, net revenue, tax, and total per project, and you export it to Excel or CSV for your billing software.
  • No project budgetsThere is no budget field or budget alert. A report grouped by project shows hours, cost, and revenue so far, and you compare them with the estimate yourself.
  • Reminders are a weekly emailThe fill-timesheet reminder is one email, sent on Friday at 6 PM while auto-locking is on. It is off by default, so each member switches it on in their notification settings.

Common questions

Can I log time from Claude Code or Cursor?

Yes. Connect an AI assistant to the Sandtime.io MCP server and ask it to create time entries from the work in front of it, such as your commits and pull requests, then check each entry it creates.

Is there an API?

Yes. The REST API lets scripts and tools read and create time entries with a personal API key, so time tracking can live inside your own tooling.

Can I fill in time I forgot to track?

Yes. Add an entry with a start and end time after the fact. A timer is optional, which suits deep work where you only surface hours later.

Does Sandtime.io watch my screen or keystrokes?

No. There are no screenshots, no screen recording and no keystroke logging. You record the time you worked, and that record is all anyone sees.

Is it free?

Yes. Sandtime.io is free for unlimited users, and the MCP server and API are included.

Free templates for this workflow

Use a practical file now, then move to Sandtime.io when collecting, approving, locking, and reporting records becomes ongoing work.

Daily, weekly, and monthly timesheets

Start with an editable daily, weekly, or monthly timesheet when a simple file still fits the process.

Client onboarding and project setup checklist

Confirm the client, scope, billing, communication, access, staffing, time-recording, risk, and readiness decisions before work begins.

Project budget and billable-hours tracker

Track budgeted hours, billable value, labor cost, and remaining project budget in a formula-driven Excel workbook.

Invoice and timesheet reconciliation worksheet

Compare approved timesheet hours and agreed rates with invoice lines, adjustments, final amounts, and supporting evidence.

Project time log

Log who worked on a project and for how long, with automatic total, billable, and non-billable hours.

Weekly status report

Share what is done, in progress, planned next, and blocked in a simple, repeatable weekly report.

Keep exploring

Continue with the most relevant Sandtime.io pages for this topic.

Use the browser extension

Install the browser extension for quicker access to timer controls, projects, reports, and timesheets.

Open page

Activity

A single time entry representing work performed. Activities are the building blocks of timesheets and reports.

Open page

Connect Sandtime.io with Slack

Add Sandtime.io to Slack so people can track time without leaving team communication, using slash commands once their Slack user is linked.

Open page

Timer

The built-in stopwatch in Sandtime.io. Start it to begin tracking time, stop it to save the entry automatically to the current day in your timesheet.

Open page

Create and manage API keys and MCP tokens

Connect your own tools or scripts to Sandtime.io using the REST API or MCP server, and revoke access any time.

Open page

Approval

The process of reviewing and accepting timesheets before payroll or billing. Ensures accuracy and compliance.

Open page

Choose the best next step

Use this workflow page as the starting point, then move to the route that answers the next buying question - proof, product fit, pricing, or immediate setup.

Start with a timesheet template

Download a free daily, weekly, or monthly timesheet for Excel or PDF when a simple file is the right starting point.

Measure lost billable hours

Estimate how much forgotten client work may already be missing from invoices before you change anything else.

Explore time tracking software

See the main commercial overview built for teams that bill, budget, and report against time.

See pricing and plan details

Review the free plan, unlimited-user model, and trust-first approach before you invite the team.

Go straight to free time tracking

Start with the free product if the problem is already clear and you want to capture work immediately.

Compare Sandtime.io with other tools

See how Sandtime.io compares with Clockify, Harvest, Toggl, Jibble, and more, with each vendor's prices checked on its own site.

Related guides

Not quite the right fit? These pages cover the situations teams most often compare before choosing.

Best Time Tracking Software for Developers

Compare ten tools developers and software houses shortlist, from Jira and Azure DevOps timesheets to logging time from the editor over MCP.

Time Tracking for Software Agencies

See how agencies catch retainer leakage, fragmented work, and scope drift before margins disappear.

How to Spot and Recover Billable Leakage

Find the gap between work done and work billed, estimate what it costs, and close it without surveillance.

Billable vs Non-Billable Hours

Learn which hours you can bill, why the split drives utilization and your real rate, and how to track it without surveillance.