timeghost Time tracking can be configured to record working time, project time, or both.
The selected time tracking setup determines which types of time are recorded in your workspace and which related features are available. Choosing the right setup therefore depends primarily on whether you want to track employees' working hours, time spent on projects and tasks, or both.
In short Choose Working time only for working hours, Project time only for project-based time tracking, or Project time with automatic working time if you need both without recording the same working period separately.
The three time tracking setups
timeghost provides three basic setups:
| Setup | Best suited for |
|---|---|
| Working time only | Organizations that primarily need to record employees' working hours, breaks, and time accounts |
| Project time only | Organizations that want to track time spent on projects and tasks without maintaining separate working time |
| Project time with automatic working time | Organizations that need both project time and working time while avoiding separate time recording |
The selected setup applies to the workspace and determines how time tracking works for its users.
Working time only
Choose Working time only if your main goal is to record when employees work rather than what projects or tasks they work on.
Users record their working time, including the beginning and end of their workday and their breaks. Working schedules, target hours, working time rules, absences, and time accounts can then be used to evaluate working hours.
Project time tracking is not part of this setup.
This setup is typically suitable if you need time and attendance tracking but do not need project-based reporting or billing.
For more information, see Working time only – what you need to know.
Project time only
Choose Project time only if you primarily want to know how much time is spent on individual projects and tasks.
Users record project time and can assign entries to projects, tasks, and other project-related information. This provides the basis for project reporting, budgets, billable time, and profitability analysis.
Working time is not maintained separately in this setup.
This setup is suitable if project-based time tracking is your primary requirement and you do not need separate working time records.
For more information, see Project time only – what you need to know.
Project time with automatic working time
Choose Project time with automatic working time if you need both project time and working time but do not want users to record the same periods twice.
Users record their project time, and timeghost automatically creates the corresponding working time based on those entries.
This allows project time and working time to remain separate types of data while project time serves as the basis for creating working time. For example, gaps between project time entries can become breaks, and overlapping project times are counted only once as working time.
This setup is particularly useful if you need project reporting as well as working time records, working time rules, or time accounts.
For more information, see Project time with automatic working time – what you need to know.
Which setup should you choose?
A simple way to decide is to consider which information you actually need:
If you need to know when employees work, choose Working time only.
If you need to know what employees spend their time on, choose Project time only.
If you need to know both, choose Project time with automatic working time.
The selected setup also affects which areas and features users see in timeghost. In addition, individual access continues to depend on roles and permissions.
Switching from project time only to automatic working time
If your workspace currently uses Project time only and you later want to introduce separate working time, timeghost provides a controlled transition to Project time with automatic working time.
A cutoff date determines when automatic working time creation begins. Existing historical project time remains unchanged.
For details about this transition, see Switching to automatic working time.
What’s next?
→ Working time only – what you need to know
Learn how time tracking works when your workspace records working time only.
→ Project time only – what you need to know
Learn how project-based time tracking works without separate working time.
→ Project time with automatic working time – what you need to know
Learn how timeghost creates working time automatically from recorded project time.
→ Switching to automatic working time
Learn what happens when an existing project-time workspace switches to automatic working time.