Rize vs Timely: Which Is Better for AI-Assisted Tracking in 2026?

Pick Rize if you work alone on Mac or Windows and want AI to categorize your apps and websites, chat about your time and surface focus insights, from $9.99/mo billed annually. Pick Timely if you bill hours on a team and want AI-drafted timesheets you approve, from $9 per user per month billed yearly. Dayflow, our app, is the free Mac option with optional on-device AI.

Rize and Timely both use AI to sort your working time, but they point it at different jobs. Rize tracks your apps and websites and turns them into focus and productivity insights for you, while Timely records work into a private timeline and has AI draft timesheet entries that a billing team approves.

Disclosure: Dayflow is our product, and it appears below as a third option. This article is a comparison of vendor documentation. Rize and Timely facts come from each vendor’s own pages as checked on October 4, 2026. Dayflow facts were reviewed against version 2.2.0 on September 6, 2026. For longer single-tool breakdowns, see our Rize alternative page and our Timely alternative page.

Quick comparison

Tool	Best for	How it tracks	Price	Platforms
Rize	Individuals who want AI focus and productivity insights	Automatic app and website tracking with AI categorization and tagging	From $9.99/mo billed annually, or $12.99/month billed monthly	Mac, Windows
Timely	Teams that bill hours	Memory tracker records work in the background; AI drafts timesheet entries to approve	From $9 per user per month billed yearly, or $11 billed monthly	Web, desktop app, iOS, Android
Dayflow (ours)	One person on a Mac who wants a readable record of the day	Screen capture at one frame every 10 seconds; AI writes a timeline	$0 (MIT); optional Pro at $20 a month	Mac only, macOS 14+

Key takeaways

• Rize is the stronger pick when the goal is understanding your own focus. Its AI categorizes, tags, answers questions in a chat and produces focus insights.
• Timely is the stronger pick when the goal is a timesheet. Its AI fills in and allocates entries, and you approve them before anyone else sees them.
• Neither has a free tier. Rize offers a 7-day trial with no credit card, Timely a 14-day trial.
• Both run in the cloud. Rize names Amazon Web Services; Timely is a web service with a private timeline.
• Dayflow, our app, is free and open source with an on-device AI option, but it is Mac only and has no team features, invoicing or website blocking.

What Rize does better

AI aimed at you, not at a timesheet. Rize’s AI features are auto-categorization, tagging, an AI chat and productivity and focus insights. That set is about answering “how did I work this week” rather than “what do I bill for.” If you want to ask questions of your own tracked time, the chat is a feature Timely’s documentation does not list.

Clear AI capacity by plan. Rize meters AI in monthly credits: 500 on Basic, 1,000 on Pro and 3,000 on Max. That lets you size a plan to how much you lean on the AI. The flip side is that heavy use pushes you up the price ladder.

Developer hooks. Pro and above add an API, webhooks, Zapier and MCP server access. MCP access means an AI assistant that supports it can connect to your Rize data. If you want time data flowing into other tools or into an assistant, Rize documents more ways to get it out.

Meeting time from your calendar. You can connect Google Calendar so meetings show up alongside app and website time.

Windows support with a low macOS floor. Rize runs on Mac (macOS Mojave 10.14.6 or later) and Windows 10 or later. Timely’s pages did not confirm which desktop operating systems its app supports, so Rize is the safer bet if you know you need a native app on both.

Client reports for solo workers. Pro and above include client and scheduled reports in PDF and CSV. A freelancer who wants to send a client a summary of hours can do that without moving to a team product.

What Timely does better

AI that produces a timesheet. Timely’s Memory tracker records work in the background across web and desktop apps into a private timeline, and AI drafts timesheet entries that you approve. The documented AI features are AI timesheets (auto-completed and auto-allocated entries) and AI time categorization. If the output you need is a clean, approved list of hours against projects, Timely is built around exactly that step.

A private timeline with an approval gate. Timely states that timelines are private and only entries you approve are shared. For teams, that is a meaningful line: the raw record stays with the person, and the manager sees the approved timesheet. If tracking feels intrusive to your team, read our piece on time tracking without surveillance for the trade-offs.

Team and budget management. Premium and above add team and budget management plus project management and accounting integrations. Unlimited adds capacity reporting and overtime tracking. Rize has team plans, but Timely documents more of the agency and consultancy workflow: budgets, capacity, overtime.

A manual timer. Timely includes a manual timer alongside the background tracker, which helps when work happens away from the computer or you want to log a block on purpose.

More platforms for the timesheet side. Timely lists web, a desktop app, iOS and Android. Reviewing and approving entries from a phone is covered.

Lower entry price per seat. Starter is $9 per user per month billed yearly, slightly under Rize Basic’s $9.99/mo billed annually. Starter is capped at 5 users and 20 projects.

Head-to-head table

Capability	Rize	Timely	Dayflow (ours)
Automatic capture	Apps and websites, auto-categorized and tagged	Memory tracker across web and desktop apps	Screen capture at one frame every 10 seconds
Manual timer	Not listed on vendor pages checked	Yes	Not listed; capture is automatic
AI summaries	AI chat, productivity and focus insights (metered by credits)	AI-drafted timesheet entries and AI categorization	AI writes the day into a readable timeline
Invoicing	Not listed; client reports in PDF and CSV on Pro+	Not listed; accounting integrations on Premium+	No
Team reports	Team plan available	Team and budget management (Premium+), capacity and overtime (Unlimited)	No
Website blocking	Not listed on vendor pages checked	Not listed on vendor pages checked	No
Data location	Cloud, hosted on Amazon Web Services	Cloud web service, private timeline	Recordings and timeline stored on your Mac; analysis local or cloud, your choice
Free tier	None; 7-day trial, no card	None; 14-day trial	$0
Platforms	Mac, Windows	Web, desktop app, iOS, Android	Mac only, macOS 14+
Open source	No	No	Yes, MIT

Pricing compared: which is cheaper for one person?

Plan	Rize	Timely
Entry	Basic: $9.99/mo billed annually, or $12.99/month billed monthly (500 AI credits)	Starter: $9 per user per month billed yearly, or $11 billed monthly (max 5 users)
Middle	Pro: $23.99/mo billed annually (1,000 AI credits)	Premium: $16 per user per month billed yearly, or $20 billed monthly (max 50 users)
Upper	Max: $39.99/mo billed annually (3,000 AI credits)	Unlimited: $22 per user per month billed yearly, or $28 billed monthly
Team	$29.99/seat/month with annual billing, or $39.99/seat/month billed monthly	Per-user pricing on every plan
Enterprise	Custom	Custom

Rize’s monthly-billing prices for Pro and Max were not readable on its pricing cards, so for those plans see the vendor’s pricing page on the Rize site. The same page’s FAQ quotes a slightly different individual price range than the cards; the card prices are used here.

For one person who wants AI-assisted tracking, the cheapest plans are close. Rize Basic costs $119.88 a year billed annually, or $155.88 if you pay month to month. Timely Starter costs $108 a year billed yearly, or $132 billed monthly. If you need Rize’s API, MCP access or client reports, you are on Pro at $287.88 a year. If you need Timely’s team and budget management or accounting integrations, Premium is $192 a year per user billed yearly. The vendor pages checked do not break out which Timely plan includes the AI timesheet features, so confirm that on the vendor’s pricing page at the Timely site before you assume Starter covers it.

Dayflow is $0. The optional Pro plan is $20 a month, or $240 over a year, and it is only needed if you want Dayflow to manage cloud analysis for you. If you are deciding whether a paid tracker earns its cost, the real hourly rate calculator helps put the numbers in context.

When to choose Rize

Choose Rize if:

• You work mostly for yourself and want AI to explain your focus patterns, not to fill a timesheet.
• You want to ask questions of your tracked time in a chat.
• You use Windows, or a Mac older than macOS 14.
• You want an API, webhooks, Zapier or MCP access to pipe time data elsewhere (Pro and above).
• You want Google Calendar meetings counted alongside app time.
• You want a trial without entering a card.

Watch the credit allowance. If you expect to use the AI chat heavily, compare the 500, 1,000 and 3,000 credit tiers against the price jump before committing.

When to choose Timely

Choose Timely if:

• Your hours turn into invoices or client reports, and you want AI to draft the entries.
• You work on a team where people should approve their own entries before they are shared.
• You need budgets, capacity or overtime reporting.
• You want project management or accounting integrations (Premium and above).
• You want to review and approve time from iOS or Android.

Timely’s own positioning is consultancies, agencies, SaaS, professional services and enterprise teams that bill hours. If that is you, it fits the job better than Rize. If you are one person who never bills by the hour, much of what you pay for goes unused.

Where both fall short: what if you want your data local?

Rize and Timely share three gaps.

Your data lives in the cloud. Rize hosts on Amazon Web Services. Timely is a web service. Both describe protections, and Timely keeps the timeline private to you, but neither documents a mode where tracking and AI analysis stay on your own computer.

There is no free way to keep using them. Both offer trials, then require a paid plan.

Neither is open source. You cannot inspect what the tracker collects or how it processes it.

This is where Dayflow, our app, fits. It records the screen at one frame every 10 seconds, stores full recordings and a local timeline on your Mac, and has AI write the day into a readable timeline. It is $0 and MIT licensed. You pick where the AI analysis happens:

• Local AI: a supported model runs on your Mac through Ollama or LM Studio, and screenshot analysis stays on-device. You need hardware that can run the model.
• Your own provider: selected screenshots go to a provider you configure, under that provider’s charges and terms.
• Dayflow Pro ($20 a month): Dayflow manages cloud analysis. Under the privacy policy, Pro deletes screenshots after processing and may retain activity data for sync.

The details of each mode are on our local and cloud processing page. One caution worth repeating: if you connect an AI assistant to Dayflow, the assistant receives the Dayflow data it retrieves in your conversation. Local storage does not make a cloud assistant conversation local.

You can export a date range as Markdown from Settings, and that file can become a weekly summary or a draft timesheet. Our guide to a Mac timesheet without manual entry walks through that. AI summaries can miss or misread work, so check the output before you share it.

Dayflow does not cover everything the other two do. That is the next section.

Where Dayflow is the wrong pick

You run a team that bills hours: choose Timely. Dayflow has no team reports, no payroll approvals and no invoicing. Timely’s AI-drafted, user-approved timesheets, budgets, capacity reporting and accounting integrations are the job it was built for.

You use Windows or an older Mac: choose Rize. Dayflow is Mac only and needs macOS 14 or later. Rize runs on Windows 10 and later and on macOS back to Mojave 10.14.6.

You want integrations out of the box: choose Rize. Rize Pro includes an API, webhooks, Zapier and MCP access. Dayflow’s documented export is Markdown.

You want polished client reports: choose Rize Pro. PDF and CSV client and scheduled reports are listed on Rize Pro and above. Dayflow produces a timeline and a Markdown export, not a formatted client report.

You want to block distracting sites. Dayflow does not block websites, and blocking is not listed on the Rize or Timely pages checked either. If blocking is the main need, look outside this trio.

You do not want to set anything up. Dayflow’s free on-device mode depends on running a local model through Ollama or LM Studio. If that sounds like a chore, either a cloud tracker or Dayflow Pro is the simpler path.

The bottom line: is Rize or Timely better for AI-assisted tracking?

For one person who wants AI to explain how they work, Rize is the better fit. Its AI chat, focus insights and auto-categorization are aimed at self-understanding, it runs on Mac and Windows, and Pro adds an API and MCP access for people who want their data in other tools. Expect to pay $119.88 a year on Basic, more if you need Pro features or more AI credits.

For anyone whose tracked time becomes billable hours, Timely is the better fit. AI that drafts timesheet entries you approve, a private timeline, and team, budget and capacity features on higher plans match how agencies and consultancies work. Starter runs $108 a year per user billed yearly, though you should confirm which plan includes the AI timesheets.

If you are on a recent Mac, work alone and care most about where your data sits, Dayflow, our app, is worth a look as the third option: free, open source and able to run its AI on your machine. It is not a team or billing tool, and it is not the answer for Windows users. To see how all three sit in the wider field, our roundup of the best time tracker for Mac options covers the rest.

Frequently asked questions

Is Rize or Timely better for freelancers?

It depends on what you do with the hours. If you bill clients and want AI to draft timesheet entries you approve, Timely is built around that, starting at $9 per user per month billed yearly. If you mainly want focus insights plus client reports in PDF and CSV, Rize Pro covers that at $23.99/mo billed annually. Neither vendor page we checked lists invoicing.

Does Rize have a free plan?

No. Rize has no permanently free tier. It offers a 7-day trial with full feature access and no credit card required. After that, the cheapest plan is Basic at $9.99/mo billed annually or $12.99/month billed monthly, which includes 500 AI credits a month. Higher plans add more credits and features such as the API and MCP server access.

Does Timely have a free plan?

No. Timely lists no free tier and offers a 14-day trial. Paid plans start with Starter at $9 per user per month billed yearly or $11 billed monthly, capped at 5 users and 20 projects. Premium is $16 per user per month billed yearly, and Unlimited is $22. Enterprise pricing is custom through sales.

Does Timely work on a Mac?

Timely lists a web app, a desktop app, iOS and Android. The vendor pages checked on October 4, 2026 did not confirm which desktop operating systems the desktop app supports, so check Timely's site before you buy. The web app runs in a browser, which works on any Mac regardless of the desktop app's support.

Where do Rize and Timely store my data?

Both are cloud services. Rize says its data is hosted on Amazon Web Services with encryption at rest and in transit. Timely is a web service and says your timeline is private, with only entries you approve shared with your team. Neither offers a local-only mode in the documentation reviewed for this comparison.

What are Rize AI credits?

Rize meters its AI features with a monthly credit allowance. Basic includes 500 AI credits a month, Pro includes 1,000 and Max includes 3,000. The AI features include auto-categorization, tagging, AI chat and productivity and focus insights. Rize's pricing page is the place to check how many credits each action uses, since that detail is not in the facts reviewed here.

Is Dayflow better than Timely for team timesheets?

No. Timely wins here. Dayflow has no team reports, payroll approvals or invoicing, and it is Mac only. Timely is built for teams that bill hours, with AI-drafted timesheets, team and budget management on Premium and above, and capacity and overtime reporting on Unlimited. Dayflow fits one person who wants to remember and review their own day.

Which tracker keeps AI analysis on my Mac?

Of the three, only Dayflow documents an on-device option. Its Local AI mode runs a supported model on your Mac through Ollama or LM Studio, so screenshot analysis stays on the device. You can also send selected screenshots to your own provider or use Dayflow Pro. Rize and Timely are cloud services.

Can I use Rize on Windows?

Yes. Rize supports Mac and Windows, with macOS Mojave 10.14.6 or later and Windows 10 or later. Linux is not yet available. That makes Rize a better pick than Dayflow for anyone who splits work across a Mac and a Windows PC, since Dayflow is Mac only and needs macOS 14 or later.