So, Toggl has introduced API limits that they say I am exceeding with my Timery usage, so it’s time to revisit my time tracking stack.
Options are:
Stay on the Toggl free plan and hope I don’t get throttled too often
This is definitely the path of least resistance, and lets me find out how much I actually exceed the API limits.
Pay for Toggl
Also low-resistance, but the US$9 per month seems a little steep, especially I have other options that are lower-cost.
Go all-in on Timing.app
I used to use Timing before using Toggl/Timery, maybe I should revisit it? I like tracking all of my time, and start/stop timers on my phone all the time. Is there a way to track offline time as I go with Timing now?
Go All-In on Harvest
I already pay for Harvest for freelance time tracking and billing, maybe I should go all-in and try to track all of my time with Harvest. It’s not really the best-suited, but I could spend an extra US$5-6 dollars per month and try their Forecast product as well.
Something else - maybe Timelines?
I looked at a couple of other time-tracking apps when I switched from Timing to Timery/Toggl, and remember liking Timelines. I thing CGP Grey is using a non-Timery app now too. What else is out there that’s maybe better?
Check if Qbserve is going to work for you - it’s a pretty great automatic MacOS time tracker. Another good option - Timemator. Both of these are one time purchase, and both are really good for the price.
If you don’t need extreme accuracy - I think blockytime (iOS/iPadOS app) is amazing for simplified and general time tracking, you assign 30 minute time blocks what you’ve done or will do.
I’ve used Timery+Toggl for the past few years for very simple workday hours tracking for tax purposes. The thing I liked about Timery is the Apple Shortcuts support so I can automate the timers based on specific triggers.
I started testing Clockify today. It doesn’t have Shortcuts support although you could interact with its API from Shortcuts. However for very simple start/stop timer it has keyboard shortcut support which could be triggered from automations. I believe you can also import your Toggl data. I plan to run them in parallel for a while and if Toggl limits get breached I may switch to Clockify.
I also reached out to the Timer developer for their input. Perhaps they can reduce the request frequency if you’re on the Toggl free tier
I did indeed. Strangely, although my usage is very basic (start at beginning of workday, stop at end), and consistent, apparently I exceeded their limits “At least once“ in the past two months
I’ve been using Timery to track my work - only on Mac, but it is about 8.5 hours of jumping back and forth between pre-set task categories. I am surprised I didn’t also get the email. I was just about to switch to Annual Timery sub instead of monthly now that they have updated it, but now I think I will wait.
The more I’ve sat pondering on this, the more I become convinced that “at least once” could be doing some seriously heavy lifting in their messaging. Combine it with their timespan for API limits being universally one hour and I suspect a lot of people may be in the category of having had perhaps 1, 2, or 3 hours in May go over the limit. Maybe early one morning when a long running timer had to be stopped, adjusted, a timer started, and then replaced because it was a 2 minute task etc, or maybe that one hour where you blitzed through the ToDo list… In reality the occasional overage is probably not enough to cause somebody to have to stop using Timery - perhaps just reorganise their usage a smidgen or wait a wee while before updating things if they’re really active. It makes me wonder if Timery could implement a queue for API calls when somebody hits the limit. It might cause sync issues but if it popped up a notification etc then it might be doable. Maybe opt in perhaps. Similar to what happens for some other software when you are out of internet coverage.
For some reason I recall someone on a podcast discussing the possibility of Timery providing their own back end service.
They may have been wishcasting rather than having anything concrete, but if there is anything behind it, now might be the perfect time to fasttrack it.
