The 5 Best Paymo Alternatives for Mac in 2026

Clockify is the closest Paymo replacement on a budget. It is free for up to 5 users, has an auto tracker, and adds invoicing from its Standard plan. Pick Harvest if invoicing clients is the main job, Toggl for planning plus time tracking, and Everhour for tracking inside Asana or Jira. Pick Dayflow if you work alone on a Mac and want an automatic, AI-written record kept locally.

Paymo is three tools in one. It is a project manager with Kanban and Gantt views, a time tracker, and an invoicing app. That mix is why people sign up, and often why they leave. Its own pricing and product pages point to three common reasons.

The first is seats. The Free and Solo plans stop at one user. Once a second person needs access, you move to Plus at $10.9 per user per month billed annually, or $15.9 billed monthly. Integrations and API access also start on Plus. The Free plan is also capped at 1 client and 2 projects.

The second is monthly pricing. Solo currently starts at $5.9 a month for the first three months under a time-limited offer, then rises to $9.9 a month on monthly billing.

The third is how it tracks. Paymo Track can record time spent in desktop apps in the background. You still have to match each recorded activity to a task and project yourself. Some people want less project management and more automation. Others want the opposite.

Dayflow is our product, and it is one of the five alternatives below. It ranks fourth, and a later section covers where it is the wrong choice. Facts about the other tools come from each vendor’s own pricing and product pages, checked on October 4, 2026. Dayflow’s details come from version 2.2.0. The method is a comparison of vendor documentation as of those dates. For the wider field, see our guide to Mac time trackers.

The short version:

• Clockify is the closest budget replacement (see our Clockify for Mac comparison).
• Harvest is the pick for invoicing.
• Toggl (formerly Toggl Track) pairs time tracking with planning (see Toggl for Mac).
• Dayflow writes your day for you.
• Everhour lives inside your project tool.

Quick comparison

Tool	Best for	How it tracks	Price
Clockify	Small teams that want Paymo’s mix of time, invoicing and scheduling for less	Timer, timesheet, calendar, kiosk, plus an auto tracker in the desktop app	Free for up to 5 users; Basic $3.99 per seat/month billed annually or $4.99 monthly
Harvest	Freelancers and teams who invoice from tracked hours	One-click timers, daily and weekly timesheets, or a connected calendar	Free (1 seat, 2 projects); Teams $9 seat/month billed annually or $11 monthly
Toggl	Teams that want time tracking and project planning in one place	Timers, timesheets, calendar integrations, plus background tracking and a timeline in the desktop app	Free for up to 3 users; Starter $9 per user/month billed annually or $12 monthly
Dayflow	One person on a Mac who wants an automatic record of the day	Captures the screen at one frame every 10 seconds; AI writes a timeline	$0, MIT licensed; optional Pro $20 a month

What Paymo does well

Paymo does a lot in one subscription. Few tools here match its range.

• Automatic tracking without screenshots. Paymo Track records time in desktop apps in the background. Paymo says these activities are stored locally on your computer, and you decide which entries get logged. That is a thoughtful design for a tool that also does project management.
• Money and work in the same place. Invoicing, estimates and expenses sit next to time tracking. The Free plan includes unlimited time tracking, tasks and invoices, which suits a solo worker with one client.
• Real project management. Higher plans add Kanban, Gantt charts, scheduling and leave planning.
• Platforms. Paymo has desktop apps for Windows, macOS and Linux, plus iOS and Android apps. Only Clockify on this list also lists Linux.
• A free trial with no card. You get 15 days to try it.

If you use the Gantt charts, send estimates and invoices from it, and work alone or with a team already on Plus, Paymo is doing its job.

Why people switch from Paymo

The one-user ceiling. Free and Solo are single-user plans. A freelancer who adds a subcontractor jumps from Solo at $5.9 a month (annual) to Plus at $10.9 per user per month (annual). That is two seats, so the bill more than triples. Clockify, Toggl and Everhour all have free plans for small teams.

Integrations cost extra. Integrations and API access start on Plus. If you work in Asana, Jira or ClickUp, the Plus plan is required just to connect them.

Monthly pricing after the offer. The monthly prices on the pricing page start low for three months and then rise. Solo goes from $5.9 to $9.9, Plus from $10.9 to $15.9, and Pro from $16.9 to $23.9. Paymo says yearly billing saves up to 40%, but that means paying a year up front.

Matching activity is still manual. Paymo Track captures app time, but turning it into project entries is your job. Some people want a tool that writes the summary for them. Others realize they only wanted a timer anyway.

Too much tool. If you never open the Gantt chart, you are paying for project management you do not use.

No AI and unclear hosting. Paymo states no AI features on the pages checked. It also does not state where its servers are. Clockify lets you choose a hosting region, and Everhour names its AWS regions.

The best Paymo alternatives, ranked

1. Clockify

What changes: Clockify covers much of Paymo’s ground at a lower per-seat price.

• The free plan runs to 5 users. It includes unlimited tracking, timer, timesheet, the desktop auto tracker, calendar, reports and apps.
• Standard and above add invoicing, time off and approvals.
• Pro adds scheduling, forecasting, expenses and GPS tracking.
• There is a Linux desktop app, so a mixed Mac and Linux team can stay on one tool.
• You can choose data hosting in the EU (Germany), UK, USA or Australia.

Price: Free for up to 5 users. Paid plans per seat per month:

Plan	Billed annually	Billed monthly
Basic	$3.99	$4.99
Standard	$5.49	$6.99
Pro	$7.99	$9.99
Enterprise	$11.99	$14.99
CAKE.com Bundle	$12.99	$15.99

The trial is 7 days of Pro features, with no credit card.

The limit: Clockify is mainly timer and timesheet based. If you rely on Paymo’s Kanban and Gantt views, check Clockify’s feature list before moving, since its listed strengths are timekeeping, invoicing and scheduling. Invoicing and approvals need a paid plan. Activity monitoring on Pro may be more oversight than a small creative team wants.

Switch to it if the per-seat jump on Paymo is the problem, and you want invoicing, an auto tracker and Linux support for less. Our Toggl vs Clockify comparison covers the closest head-to-head.

2. Harvest

What changes: Harvest drops project management and focuses on hours and money.

• You track with one-click timers, daily or weekly timesheets, or a connected calendar.
• Invoices are built from tracked time, with online payments and expense tracking.
• Harvest also lists team reporting and accounting integrations such as QuickBooks and Xero.
• Enterprise adds profitability reporting and timesheet approvals.
• Harvest is now owned by Bending Spoons, according to its site footer.

Price: The Free plan covers 1 seat and 2 projects and still includes invoicing and expenses. Teams is $9 per seat per month ($108 per seat, billed annually), or $11 billed monthly. Enterprise is $14 per seat per month billed annually, or $17.50 billed monthly. Enterprise Plus has custom pricing. The trial is 30 days, with no credit card.

The limit: Harvest lists no automatic activity capture. If you liked Paymo Track recording app time in the background, you lose that. Its listed strengths are invoicing, expenses and reporting, so Paymo’s Kanban and Gantt views have no counterpart in what it lists.

Switch to it if invoicing clients is the core job and Paymo’s project features were going unused. For more on billing workflows, see how to track billable hours on a Mac. We also have a separate list of Harvest alternatives if you want to compare further.

3. Toggl

What changes: Toggl now combines time tracking and planning under one name. Toggl Track and Toggl Plan are legacy products for existing users.

• You track with manual and real-time timers, timesheets and calendar integrations.
• The desktop app adds automated background tracking and a timeline. Toggl says it does not take screenshots or record keystrokes.
• Planning covers timelines, tasks and capacity management.
• Toggl AI answers natural-language questions about workspace data. There is also an MCP server and an AI Task Creator.

Price: Free for up to 3 users. Starter is $9 per user per month billed annually, or $12 billed monthly. Premium is $16 per user per month billed annually, or $24 billed monthly. Enterprise means contacting the vendor. Paid plans include a 30-day trial.

The limit:

• Toggl is still mainly timer and manual entry, not a full automatic record.
• Billable rates need a paid plan.
• Timesheet approvals, profitability reports and the Jira and Asana integrations are Premium only.

Switch to it if you want Paymo’s mix of planning and time tracking, with AI on top and a free plan for a team of three. Toggl vs Harvest helps if you are torn between the two.

4. Dayflow

What changes: Dayflow drops timers and the job of matching activities to tasks. It captures your screen at one frame every 10 seconds, and AI writes the day into a readable timeline.

• Full screen recordings and the local timeline are stored on your Mac.
• You choose where analysis runs. Local AI through Ollama or LM Studio keeps screenshot analysis on-device. Your own cloud provider or Dayflow Pro processes selected screenshots off-device. Our page on local and cloud processing explains the trade-offs.
• You can export a date range as Markdown from Settings → Export.
• The code is MIT licensed.

Price: $0. The optional Pro plan is $20 a month for managed cloud analysis. Dayflow needs macOS 14 or later. See pricing.

The limit: Dayflow is not a Paymo replacement for billing. It has no invoices, payroll approvals, team reports or website blocking. It runs on Mac only. AI summaries can miss or misinterpret work, so check them before you share anything.

Switch to it if you work alone on a Mac, want an honest record of your day without starting timers, and already invoice elsewhere or not at all. Building a timesheet without manual entry shows how the export fits a billing workflow.

5. Everhour

What changes: Everhour puts the timer inside the tools where your tasks already live. You log timer and manual entries against tasks in Asana, Jira, ClickUp, Linear, Trello and others, or in Everhour’s own projects. It lists more than 40 integrations. A single paid tier includes budgets with alerts, invoicing, expenses, time off and scheduling, plus SSO and advanced permissions. Everhour says it hosts on AWS in Oregon (USA) and Frankfurt (Germany), with data replicated across both regions.

Price: Free for up to 5 seats with limited features, and no integrations. Team is $8.50 per seat per month billed yearly, or $10 billed monthly, with a minimum of 5 seats. Custom pricing means contacting the vendor and starts at 50 seats. The trial is 14 days with all features and no credit card.

The limit:

• The 5-seat minimum makes Team expensive for a solo worker.
• The free plan excludes integrations, which are the main reason to choose Everhour.
• The desktop app is a macOS menu bar app that needs an internet connection.
• The AI Tracker, which detects work without a timer, is early access only.

Switch to it if your team already runs projects in Asana, Jira or ClickUp. In that case, Paymo’s built-in project management is duplicate work.

Alternatives by reason for leaving

• Adding a second user costs too much: Clockify, which is free for up to 5 users.
• Invoicing is what you actually use: Harvest.
• You want planning and time tracking with AI: Toggl.
• Your projects already live in Asana, Jira or ClickUp: Everhour.
• Matching Paymo Track activities by hand is tedious: Dayflow, which writes the timeline for you.
• You need to choose the country your data is hosted in: Clockify.
• You need a Linux desktop app: Clockify.

Full comparison table

Tool	Price	Automatic capture	Where data lives	Platforms	Open source
Paymo	Free (1 user); Solo $5.9/month annually or $9.9 monthly; Plus $10.9/user/month annually or $15.9 monthly; Pro $16.9/user/month annually or $23.9 monthly	Yes, Paymo Track records desktop app time; you match entries to tasks	Cloud; Paymo Track activities stored locally; server location not stated	Web, Windows, Mac, Linux, iOS, Android	No
Clockify	Free (up to 5 users); paid from $3.99 to $12.99 per seat/month annually, or $4.99 to $15.99 monthly	Auto tracker in the desktop app	Cloud, with hosting in the EU (Germany), UK, USA or Australia	Web, Mac, Windows, Linux, iOS, Android, browser extensions	No
Harvest	Free (1 seat, 2 projects); Teams $9 seat/month annually or $11 monthly; Enterprise $14 annually or $17.50 monthly; Enterprise Plus custom	None listed	Cloud	Web, Mac, Windows, iOS, Android, browser extensions	No
Toggl	Free (up to 3 users); Starter $9 per user/month annually or $12 monthly; Premium $16 annually or $24 monthly; Enterprise contact vendor	Background tracking and a timeline in the desktop app	Cloud	Web, Mac, Windows, iOS, Android, browser extensions	No
Dayflow	$0; optional Pro $20 a month	Yes, one screen frame every 10 seconds, summarized by AI	Recordings and timeline on your Mac; analysis local or cloud, depending on the mode you choose	Mac (macOS 14+)	Yes, MIT
Everhour	Free (up to 5 seats); Team $8.50 per seat/month yearly or $10 monthly, minimum 5 seats; Custom contact vendor	Only as an early-access AI Tracker	Cloud, AWS in Oregon (USA) and Frankfurt (Germany)	Web, Mac (menu bar app), mobile, browser extension	No

When should you stay with Paymo?

Stay if you use what only Paymo combines here: Kanban, Gantt charts, scheduling and leave planning in the same tool as estimates, invoices and expenses. Clockify comes closest on scheduling and invoicing.

Stay if you work alone with a single client. The Free plan gives you unlimited time tracking, tasks and invoices, and none of the alternatives offers that exact bundle for $0. Harvest’s free plan comes closest, with invoicing for 1 seat and 2 projects.

Stay if you need a Linux desktop app and want automatic app tracking that keeps recorded activities on your machine until you log them. Before you switch, try the yearly price. Solo at $5.9 a month billed annually may cost less than moving a whole workflow somewhere else.

Where Dayflow is the wrong pick

Dayflow is not the answer for several common Paymo use cases. Here is what to pick instead.

• You invoice clients from your hours. Pick Harvest, or stay with Paymo. Dayflow has no invoicing.
• You manage a team. Pick Toggl or Clockify. Dayflow has no team reports or payroll approvals.
• You plan projects. Stay with Paymo, or pick Toggl for timelines and capacity. Dayflow records what you did; it does not plan what comes next.
• Anyone on your team uses Windows or Linux. Pick Clockify. Dayflow runs on macOS 14 or later only.
• You want to track time inside Asana or Jira. Pick Everhour.
• You want website blocking. Dayflow does not block sites. It only records what happened.
• You need exact figures. Dayflow’s AI summaries can miss or misinterpret work. Treat the timeline as a draft to check, not a billing record.

The bottom line

Paymo is a capable all-in-one tool. People usually leave because of the one-user limit on cheaper plans, integrations that start on Plus, or a mismatch between how much project management they pay for and how much they use.

• For the closest replacement at a lower per-seat price, start with Clockify.
• If billing clients is the real job, Harvest is the cleaner fit.
• If you want planning and time tracking with AI, choose Toggl.
• If your work already lives in Asana or Jira, choose Everhour.
• If you work alone on a Mac and want the day written for you, try Dayflow. It costs $0, and recordings stay on your Mac.

Whichever you pick, run the real hourly rate calculator once you have a month of data. It shows whether the tool is paying for itself.

Frequently asked questions

Is there a free alternative to Paymo for Mac?

Several. Clockify's free plan covers up to 5 users and includes its auto tracker. Toggl is free for up to 3 users. Everhour is free for up to 5 seats but leaves out integrations. Harvest is free for 1 seat and 2 projects, with invoicing included. Dayflow costs $0 and is MIT licensed, though it runs on macOS 14 or later only and has no invoicing.

Which Paymo alternative is best for invoicing clients?

Harvest. It builds invoices from tracked time, accepts online payments, tracks expenses and connects to QuickBooks and Xero. Its free plan includes invoicing for 1 seat and 2 projects. Clockify adds invoicing from its Standard plan, and Everhour includes invoicing in its Team plan. Dayflow does not create invoices at all.

Is Dayflow better than Paymo for billing clients?

No. If billing is the job, Paymo or Harvest beats Dayflow. Both create invoices and track expenses, and Paymo also handles estimates. Dayflow has no invoicing, payroll approvals or team reports. It gives you an automatic timeline of what you worked on, which you can export as Markdown and use to fill in a timesheet in another tool.

Does Paymo track time automatically on a Mac?

Partly. The Paymo Track desktop app can run in the background and record time spent in desktop apps. You then match those activities to tasks and projects yourself. Paymo says these automatically recorded activities are stored locally on your computer, and that you choose which entries get logged. It also offers a stopwatch timer, manual entries, bulk timesheets and a Pomodoro timer.

What is the cheapest paid alternative to Paymo?

Clockify Basic, at $3.99 per seat per month billed annually or $4.99 billed monthly. Paymo Solo is $5.9 a month billed annually or $9.9 billed monthly, and Paymo Plus is $10.9 per user per month billed annually. Everhour's Team plan is $8.50 per seat per month billed yearly, but it bills a minimum of 5 seats.

Can I track time inside Asana or Jira instead of using Paymo?

Yes. Everhour logs time against tasks inside connected tools such as Asana, Jira, ClickUp, Linear and Trello, and it lists more than 40 integrations. Integrations are not included on its free plan. Toggl offers Jira and Asana integrations on its Premium plan, which is $16 per user per month billed annually or $24 billed monthly.

Which time tracker keeps my data on my Mac?

Dayflow stores full screen recordings and its timeline on your Mac. With Local AI through Ollama or LM Studio, screenshot analysis stays on-device as well. Paymo says activities recorded by Paymo Track are stored locally, but the rest of a Paymo account lives in the cloud. Harvest, Toggl, Everhour and Clockify are cloud services.

Is Toggl Track still available?

The product is now presented as Toggl, which combines time tracking with planning, and toggl.com/track redirects to toggl.com. Toggl describes Toggl Track and Toggl Plan as legacy products that existing users can still use. The current plans are Free for up to 3 users, Starter, Premium and Enterprise.

Do any Paymo alternatives use AI?

Toggl offers Toggl AI for natural-language questions about workspace data, plus an MCP server and an AI Task Creator. Dayflow uses AI to turn screen captures into a written timeline, either locally or in the cloud. Everhour advertises an AI Tracker as early access only. Clockify and Harvest list no AI features, and Paymo states none on the pages checked.