As an IT professional, there seems to be no way around tracking time. Either you bill by the hour, and have to track time, or you work for a company which wants to know who’s been where when.  (I’m sure there’s something in between, but I’m not currently looking for a job.)

In any case, when I needed a time tracker, I looked at a lot of them.  ChronoMate won hands down. It’s fast (opens with option-spacebar for me) holds multiple timers, even connects to multiple FreshBooks accounts if you need to (I do).

What I didn’t know right away was that if you click the “Hist.” button, ChronoMate provides a fantastic view into your previous entries. I use this to reconcile my hours spent, and editing entries is a breeze compared to the FreshBooks UI.

So, if you use FreshBooks, this $20 mac app is a no-brainer. If you don’t yet use FreshBooks, you might find yourself starting a trial, even if only for a free account in which you can store your ChronoMate-tracked time.

This history button is a simple view into your logged time.