owntime vs Clockify
“Clockify is free.” Yes. And Harvest was affordable, once.
This page isn’t about features — Clockify has plenty. It’s about what a free tier is for, and what happens to it when the company behind it needs revenue.
| owntime | Clockify | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $99 once per person. No upsell path. | Free tier; paid plans add invoicing-adjacent extras (roughly $4–8/user/mo). Check current. |
| Business model | Sell software. That’s it. No data, no ads, no upsell ladder. | Freemium: free now, monetize later via tiers and add-ons |
| Data location | Your disk, SQLite file you own | Clockify cloud, CSV export |
| Invoicing | Select entries → tax → PDF, today, in the box | Paid feature territory |
| Kiosk/scheduling/PTO | No. Not our lane. | Yes, growing suite (CAKE.com ecosystem) |
| Offline | Fully | Limited |
| What can change under you | Nothing. The file stops listening. | Tier limits, feature moves, pricing. All subject to change. |
What Clockify does well
- Genuinely generous free tier. Unlimited users and projects on the basics. Credit where due.
- Broad feature set — time off, scheduling, kiosk mode. If you need those, they have them.
- Team tooling that scales further up than we ever intend to go.
The free-tier question, stated plainly
A free product is an investment. Investors expect returns, returns come from converting free users to paid ones or from the data and distribution the free tier builds. Maybe Clockify stays free forever; maybe the free tier narrows the way Harvest’s pricing widened. You don’t control that outcome. With owntime there’s nothing left to take: you paid once, the file is yours, and the company could disappear without touching your copy.
If free covers your actual needs, use it — seriously. But if you bill clients by the hour, you need invoicing anyway, and invoicing is exactly where free tiers end and paid tiers begin. At which point compare $99 once against the monthly line item.
Quick chooser
| Your situation | Pick |
|---|---|
| Basic solo tracking, no billing, happy in the cloud | Clockify free. Truly. |
| You invoice clients from tracked time | owntime — invoicing included, no tier |
| You’ve been repriced once already this decade | owntime — structurally immune |
| Need kiosk mode / PTO / scheduling suites | Clockify (or a dedicated HR tool) |
| Want your history in one file you keep forever | owntime |