Self-Hosted Alternatives to Toggl Track

Why Replace Toggl Track?

Cost. Toggl’s free tier limits you to 5 users with basic features. The Starter plan costs $10/user/month. A 5-person team pays $600/year. Self-hosted alternatives cost nothing beyond the server you already run.

Feature gating. Toggl locks time estimates, billable rates, project templates, and fixed-fee projects behind paid plans. Kimai includes all of these for free.

Privacy. Toggl stores your time data on their servers. Every project, client, and billable rate lives in their cloud. Your business operations data deserves to be on hardware you control.

Data portability. Exporting data from Toggl requires manual CSV exports. Self-hosted tools give you direct database access — your data is always yours.

Pricing changes. Toggl has increased prices multiple times. The 2024 price restructuring removed several features from lower tiers. Self-hosted tools don’t have pricing surprises.

Best Alternatives

Kimai — Best Overall Replacement

Kimai is the closest self-hosted equivalent to Toggl Track’s full feature set. It covers time tracking, project management, customer billing, invoicing, and team management — everything Toggl offers across its paid tiers, available for free.

Kimai’s time entry interface works similarly to Toggl’s: click start to begin tracking, or manually enter time entries. Projects belong to customers, activities belong to projects, and time entries are assigned to activities. The reporting system generates summaries by project, customer, user, or date range.

What Kimai adds that Toggl charges for: built-in invoicing with customizable templates, customer management, expense tracking, and 80+ plugins for additional features.

Best for: Teams and freelancers who use Toggl for client billing and project time tracking.

[Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Kimai]

Traggo — Best Lightweight Alternative

Traggo replaces Toggl for personal time tracking with a more flexible approach. Instead of Toggl’s project → task hierarchy, Traggo uses tags — arbitrary key-value pairs like project:website, type:design, billable:yes. This means you can categorize time in ways Toggl’s rigid structure doesn’t support.

Traggo runs as a single container using 30 MB of RAM with an embedded SQLite database. No MySQL, no external dependencies. If Toggl’s simplicity is what you liked, Traggo matches that minimalism.

Best for: Individual users who want simple, flexible time tracking without team features or invoicing.

[Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Traggo]

Migration Guide

Export from Toggl

1. Log in to track.toggl.com
2. Go to Reports → select date range → Export → CSV
3. The export includes: project, client, description, start/end time, duration, tags, billable status

Import to Kimai

Kimai accepts CSV imports via the ImportBundle plugin:

1. Install the ImportBundle plugin
2. Map Toggl CSV columns to Kimai fields (project → project, client → customer, start → begin, end → end)
3. Run the import

For manual migration, create customers and projects in Kimai first, then use the REST API to import time entries programmatically.

Import to Traggo

Traggo doesn’t have a direct CSV import. Use the GraphQL API to create time entries:

mutation {
  createTimeSpan(
    start: "2026-02-01T09:00:00Z"
    end: "2026-02-01T17:00:00Z"
    tags: [
      { key: "project", stringValue: "website" }
      { key: "client", stringValue: "acme" }
    ]
  ) { id }
}

Write a script to read the Toggl CSV and submit entries via GraphQL.

Cost Comparison

	Toggl (5 users, Starter)	Kimai (self-hosted)	Traggo (self-hosted)
Monthly cost	$50/month	$0	$0
Annual cost	$600/year	$0	$0
3-year cost	$1,800	$0	$0
Invoicing	Premium plan ($20/user/mo)	Included free	Not available
Users	5 (plan limit)	Unlimited	Unlimited
Data ownership	Toggl’s servers	Your server	Your server
Server cost	N/A	Runs on existing hardware	Runs on existing hardware

What You Give Up

Mobile apps. Toggl has polished native apps for iOS and Android. Kimai has community-maintained mobile apps that are functional but less polished. Traggo is web-only (responsive design works on mobile browsers).

Integrations. Toggl integrates with 100+ tools (Jira, Asana, GitHub, etc.) via native integrations and browser extensions. Kimai has 80+ plugins but fewer third-party integrations. Traggo has a GraphQL API for custom integrations.

Idle detection. Toggl’s desktop app detects when you’re idle and prompts you. Neither Kimai nor Traggo have desktop apps with idle detection. You’ll need discipline to start/stop timers manually.

Calendar view. Toggl’s calendar view is well-implemented. Kimai has a calendar view. Traggo uses a timeline/dashboard approach instead.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can Kimai generate invoices from tracked time?

Yes. Kimai has built-in invoicing with customizable templates (HTML, DOCX, PDF). Select a date range and customer, and Kimai generates an invoice from billable time entries with hourly rates, project breakdowns, and totals. This replaces Toggl’s premium invoicing feature ($20/user/month plan) at zero cost. Export invoices as PDF or send directly via email.

Does Kimai support team timesheets with approval workflows?

Yes. Team leaders can view timesheets for all team members, lock entries to prevent editing, and export approved timesheets. Kimai’s permission system supports roles (admin, teamlead, user) with configurable access levels. This covers Toggl’s team management features without per-seat charges.

Can I track billable vs non-billable time?

Yes, in both tools. Kimai marks time entries as billable or non-billable per activity, with separate billing rates per customer, project, or activity. Traggo handles this through tags — add a billable:yes or billable:no tag to any time span. Reports can filter by billable status.

Is there a browser extension for self-hosted time tracking?

Kimai has a browser bookmarklet and a Chrome extension (Kimai Time Tracker) that starts timers from your browser. For deeper integration, the Kimai API lets you build custom browser extensions or connect with automation tools. Toggl’s browser extension is more polished, but Kimai’s options cover the core use case.

How do I run time reports similar to Toggl’s reports?

Kimai provides detailed reporting by customer, project, activity, user, and date range. Export reports as CSV, PDF, or Excel. The built-in charts show time distribution and trends. For advanced visualization, connect Kimai’s database to Grafana and build custom dashboards. Traggo offers dashboards with tag-based filtering for flexible reporting.

Can multiple team members track time on the same project?

Yes. Kimai supports unlimited users, all tracking time against shared customers and projects. Each user sees only their own entries by default; team leads and admins see everyone’s entries. Traggo supports multiple users with individual dashboards. Both handle concurrent time tracking without conflicts.

How do I migrate years of Toggl data to Kimai?

Export your entire Toggl history as CSV (Reports → Export → CSV with the maximum date range). Install Kimai’s ImportBundle plugin, which provides CSV import with field mapping. Map Toggl columns (Project, Client, Description, Start, End, Duration) to Kimai fields. The import handles thousands of entries. Run the import, verify a sample of entries, and you’re done.

Related

• How to Self-Host Kimai
• How to Self-Host Traggo
• Kimai vs Traggo
• Best Self-Hosted Time Tracking
• Docker Compose Basics