The free time tracker gives you a PDF and sells you the CSV
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The Short Answer
- Kimai — Kimai's features page states "Timesheet data can be exported and shared with in XLSX, PDF, CSV and HTML format" and that "each installation supports unlimited users" — it is AGPL-3.0 software you host yourself.
- Harvest — Harvest's help centre states "The time report (Reports > Time) can be exported to Excel or CSV" with no plan condition, but the free plan is "1 seat" and "2 projects".
- Clockify — Clockify's pricing page lists free export as "PDF only" against the paid "Export reports (PDF, CSV, Excel)", caps free at "Up to 5 users", and limits free report history to one month.
- Toggl Track — Toggl's comparison grid checks "PDF exports" on Free and "XLS/CSV export" only from Starter up, and never states a number for "Free for a limited number of users".
| Product | Best for | From | Free plan | Free-plan export |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kimai | Four formats, no seat cap, no vendor | Free only | Yes | Data file, no seat cap |
| Harvest | CSV is free, the second person is not | $9/mo (annual) | Yes | PDF only, or seat-capped |
| Clockify | PDF only, and a sixth colleague ends it | $3.99/mo (annual) | Yes | PDF only, or seat-capped |
| Toggl Track | PDF on free, XLS/CSV from Starter | $9/mo (annual) | Yes | PDF only, or seat-capped |
Two vendors drew the line in exactly the same place
Toggl Track and Clockify compete with each other, price differently, and describe their free plans in different language. On the question of what your hours come out as, they are identical:
| Free | From the first paid tier | |
|---|---|---|
| Toggl Track | PDF exports | XLS/CSV export |
| Clockify | PDF only | Export reports (PDF, CSV, Excel) |
Both give you a document. Neither gives you data. That is a more precise place to put a paywall than a usage cap, because it does not stop you doing anything — you can track all the hours you like, look at all the reports, and print them. It stops you doing anything else with them.
We have seen this exact shape once before on this site, in a category with no relationship to this one: Zety hands a free user a plain-text resume and charges for the formatted file. Same move, different artefact. Give away the readable version, sell the usable one. Two categories is enough to name it, and worth watching for in the next.
Harvest inverts it, which is more useful than it sounds
Harvest does not play the format game. Its help centre says the time report “can be exported to Excel or CSV” and attaches no plan condition to it — only custom column selection is reserved for Enterprise. What Harvest restricts instead is people: “1 seat” and “2 projects”.
That is a cleaner trade, and easier to reason about. A seat cap tells you exactly when the free plan stops working — the day a second person needs it. A format restriction never stops working; it just quietly makes every downstream task manual, and you may not notice you are paying for it in time rather than money.
Toggl’s cap is the one to be wariest of, because it is not a number. “Free for a limited number of users” is the entire statement, repeated in the FAQ when the FAQ is asked directly. You cannot plan around a limit the vendor will not name.
Four formats, no seat cap, no vendor
1. Kimai — Four formats, no seat cap, no vendor
The only one here with no format restriction and no seat restriction — and a server to run.
Best for Freelancers, agencies, and companies wanting self-hosted, open-source time tracking
From Free only. Free plan: Kimai is free, self-hosted, open-source software licensed AGPL-3.0 (per the LICENSE file at github.com/kimai/kimai, the vendor's own repo). There is no vendor-imposed seat cap in the software: Kimai's features page states "Kimai can be used by as many users as you want: each installation supports unlimited users with different roles" and "Knows no limits... You can create an unlimited amount of users, customers, projects, activities, timesheets and more." Separately, the vendor also sells a hosted 'Kimai Cloud' SaaS (not the free/OSS product) at kimai.org/en/pricing: Standard plan "€ 2.99" per user/month billed annually ("You save 20% compared to monthly billing") or "€ 3.99" billed monthly; Professional plan "€ 3.99" annually or "€ 4.99" monthly. These are EUR prices for the paid cloud product, not the free self-hosted tier, and are not converted here..
Kimai's own features page states "Timesheet data can be exported and shared with in XLSX, PDF, CSV and HTML format" and that "each installation supports unlimited users." Since the self-hosted software is AGPL-3.0 licensed and free of vendor license fees (confirmed via github.com/kimai/kimai's own LICENSE file), export to CSV/Excel/PDF is available with no vendor-stated seat cap — you only pay if you opt into the vendor's separate paid Kimai Cloud hosting.
Pros
- Self-hosted edition is free and open source (AGPL-3.0) with "unlimited users" per the vendor's own features page
- Native export to four file formats — "XLSX, PDF, CSV and HTML" — per the features page, with no plan gate mentioned
- "Exported records can be locked and protected against further changes," per the same feature description
Skip it if
- Kimai's pricing page (kimai.org/en/pricing) only publishes its paid Cloud hosting tiers in EUR — it states no self-hosting infrastructure costs
- "Free" for self-hosting excludes server/maintenance costs, which the vendor's own pages don't quantify
- No plans array applies here since Kimai sells no vendor-run free tier — only self-hosted OSS or paid Cloud
CSV is free, the second person is not
2. Harvest — CSV is free, the second person is not
Restricts who, not what — and tells you the number.
From $9/mo (annual). Free plan: "$0 forever." Free includes: "1 seat", "2 projects", "Time tracking", "Invoicing", "Expense tracking", "Mac & iOS apps." Page note: "The usage of some features may require the payment of fees. See our Help Center." The pricing page's comparison table shows "Custom exports" (tooltip: "Export to CSV with your own column selection") checked only on the Enterprise column, not Free or Teams..
- Teams — $11/mo, or $9/mo billed annually (Comparison table lists "Seats: Unlimited." $108/seat billed annually (=$9/seat/mo); $11/seat/mo billed monthly.)
- Enterprise — $17.50/mo, or $14/mo billed annually ("Seats: Unlimited." $168/seat billed annually (=$14/seat/mo); $17.50/seat/mo billed monthly.)
- Enterprise Plus — price not shown on the page we opened ("Contact sales" — custom pricing, per getharvest.com/pricing.)
Harvest's help center (support.getharvest.com, fetched via the site's own Zendesk API endpoint after the HTML page returned a Cloudflare 403) states: "Anyone can export the time data they have access to from Reports > Time and Reports > New report > Detailed time. The time report (Reports > Time) can be exported to Excel or CSV," with no plan restriction attached to that baseline export — only "Custom exports" (custom column selection) is gated to Enterprise per the pricing page. So the Free plan's single seat can export CSV/Excel time data, but the plan is hard-capped at "1 seat" and "2 projects" before you must pay.
Pros
- Free plan's single seat can export time data to Excel or CSV via Reports > Time, per Harvest's help center
- Free plan is "$0 forever" with no trial expiration, per the pricing page
- Paid Teams plan offers unlimited seats starting at $9/seat/month billed annually
Skip it if
- Free plan is hard-capped at "1 seat" and "2 projects" — a second teammate or third project requires payment
- "Custom exports" (choosing your own columns) is Enterprise-only per the pricing comparison table
- The pricing page itself never states free-plan export availability — that required Harvest's separate help center article to confirm
PDF only, and a sixth colleague ends it
3. Clockify — PDF only, and a sixth colleague ends it
The most generous free seat count of the hosted three, and PDF-only reports.
From $3.99/mo (annual). Free plan: "For up to 5 users." $0. Comparison table: "Unlimited users" row shows "Up to 5 users" for Free (tooltip: "Invite people to track time in Clockify"). Reports: "The data range on the FREE plan is 1 month" ("Up to 1 month")..
- Basic — $4.99/mo, or $3.99/mo billed annually
- Standard — $6.99/mo, or $5.49/mo billed annually
- Pro — $9.99/mo, or $7.99/mo billed annually
- Enterprise — $14.99/mo, or $11.99/mo billed annually
- Cake.com Bundle — $15.99/mo, or $12.99/mo billed annually (Bundles Clockify Enterprise with Plaky and Pumble; not a Clockify-only plan.)
Clockify's own pricing page lists the free tier's export capability as "PDF only," while paid plans get "Export reports (PDF, CSV, Excel) and share live links with others." The Free plan itself is capped at "Up to 5 users." So a free workspace can export a PDF of time entries but not CSV/Excel, and stops being free once a 6th person joins.
Pros
- Generous free seat cap: "Up to 5 users" before you must pay, per the pricing page
- Free plan includes at least PDF export, per the comparison table
- Transparent, published per-seat pricing on four paid tiers with both monthly and annual rates
Skip it if
- Free-plan export is "PDF only" — CSV/Excel export is paid-plan only
- Free plan report history/date range is capped at "1 month"
- Hard 5-user cap on Free; a 6th teammate forces an upgrade
PDF on free, XLS/CSV from Starter
4. Toggl Track — PDF on free, XLS/CSV from Starter
Same format line as Clockify, with an unnamed seat cap behind it.
From $9/mo (annual). Free plan: "Free for a limited number of users." $0. The page and its FAQ ("Is Toggl Track free for an unlimited number of users?" → "The Free plan supports a limited number of users.") never state the exact seat cap. Free includes time tracking on web/desktop/mobile, 100+ tool integrations, Google & Outlook Calendar integrations, productivity reports, and up to 2 report-grouping levels (vs. 3 on paid)..
- Starter — $12/mo, or $9/mo billed annually (Per license/month; figures from support.toggl.com/basic-information-on-toggl-track-pricing ("Starter Monthly: Starts at 12 USD/EUR", "Starter Annual: 9 USD/EUR"). No free/vacant licenses on paid plans.)
- Premium — $20/mo, or $18/mo billed annually (Standard rates per support.toggl.com ("Premium Monthly: Starts at 20 USD/EUR", "Premium Annual: 18 USD/EUR"). The pricing page currently promotes a first-year annual rate of $14/license/month that "renews at $18 per license per month.")
- Enterprise — price not shown on the page we opened ("Custom pricing. Turnkey solution" — contact sales, per toggl.com/track/pricing/.)
Toggl's pricing-page comparison grid marks "PDF exports" (tooltip: "Export reports and invoices to PDF files") as included on Free, while "XLS/CSV export" (tooltip: "Export reports and invoices to XLS/CSV files") is only checked from Starter up. So the free plan can export a PDF file of reports but not CSV/Excel. The page also never states a numeric seat cap for Free — only "Free for a limited number of users" and "Invite a limited number of people for free."
Pros
- Free plan includes PDF export of reports, per the pricing page's feature grid
- Starter unlocks XLS/CSV export at $9/license/month (annual) / $12/license/month (monthly)
- Free tier still gets 100+ tool integrations and calendar sync per the pricing page
Skip it if
- The pricing page never states the exact number of users allowed free — only "a limited number of users"
- CSV/XLS export of reports is not available on Free; it requires Starter or above
- Premium's advertised $14/mo rate is a first-year-only promo that renews at $18/mo
What this means if you are choosing today
Tracking your own hours and billing from them: Harvest’s free plan is the only hosted one that hands you a CSV, and one seat is exactly what a solo user needs. Two projects is the limit to watch.
A small team that mostly needs to see where time went: Clockify’s five free users beat Harvest’s one, and PDF reports are enough if nothing downstream consumes them. The one-month report history is the sharper constraint — it means the free plan cannot answer a question about last quarter.
If the hours feed anything else — invoices, a spreadsheet, a client report — check the export format before the price. That is the row that decides whether the tool saves you time or moves it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which free time tracker exports CSV?
Harvest and Kimai. Harvest's help centre states the time report "can be exported to Excel or CSV" without attaching a plan condition, though the free plan is one seat and two projects. Kimai exports "XLSX, PDF, CSV and HTML" with no seat cap, because it is AGPL-3.0 software you run yourself. Toggl Track and Clockify both restrict free export to PDF.
Why does PDF versus CSV matter?
Because they are different kinds of object. A PDF is a document you can read; a CSV is data you can compute on and move. If you need to invoice from your hours, reconcile them against a budget, or take them to another tool, a PDF makes you re-key everything by hand. The free tier is not withholding your data — it is withholding the form in which the data is useful.
How many people can use a free time tracker?
Clockify says "Up to 5 users." Harvest says "1 seat." Toggl Track never says: its page and FAQ both answer only "a limited number of users", which is the vaguest cap in this comparison and the one hardest to plan around. Kimai states "each installation supports unlimited users", but you are the one running the installation.
Is Kimai really free?
The self-hosted software is, under AGPL-3.0 — we confirmed the licence against the project's own repository rather than a description of it. There is a separate paid Kimai Cloud if you would rather not run a server, priced in euros. So the honest phrasing is that Kimai has no licence fee and a real hosting cost, whether you pay it to a vendor or to yourself in time.
Did you run these exports yourselves?
No. Every verdict was read on the vendor's own pricing page or help centre on 6 August 2026 and is labelled as read, not run. Two of the four pages fought us — Harvest's help centre returned a Cloudflare 403 until we read it through the site's own Zendesk API endpoint — and where we could not read something we recorded that instead of guessing.
How We Keep This Updated
Prices move and vendors rewrite their plan tables, so every value on this page carries the date we read it. When a page changes, the change lands here rather than being edited away quietly. The procedure is on the methodology page. tell us and we will re-check it.
- 2026-08-06 — First published. Export rows read on each vendor's own pricing comparison or help centre; Kimai's AGPL-3.0 licence confirmed against the LICENSE file in the project's own repository rather than a summary of it.