RescueTime Reviews

“Find where you're leaking time

Pros

Once I set this up, it is so easy to forget about it. Few pieces of software actually encourage you to NOT use them. I really appreciated this. Only a browser extension and another small installer for my operating system means I'm ready to monitor my time very fast.

Cons

There are not a lot of features to talk about, so its hard to even call this a con. But I think other pieces of software that do similar things might have more features. I would have liked to be able to more specifically fine-tune the hours of operation and the software or websites it should monitor. The reports are not amazing, at least in the free version.

“Deeply personalized data on your tech habits

Pros

RescueTime was easy to set up, and after a brief period, it provided deep insight into my digital habits. I love that RescueTime categorizes the different types of software I use by default to measure how productively I am using my time. Every week I get an overview of how I have spent my time, which helps me make better decisions.

Cons

For me, the value of RescueTime can fall flat after the initial experience. Once I got acquainted with my habits, I found the reports more discouraging or distracting than insightful.

“Great app for making you aware of how much time you waste

Pros

Not only are the categories already extremely thorough, but the ability to create my own categories is just awesome! I only used this app for about six months before I stopped, not because I did not like it, but because I got everything I needed out of it: better time management skills.

Cons

This is not the apps fault, but it goes for any app meant to help build habits or increase productivity: For the first week or so, I had a lot of "setting up" before it started working for me. I had to categorize each site I visited so that it could build up a dictionary/library and give me metrics. Like I said, though, the app does this well, it's just tedious at the beginning.

“RescueTime

Pros

It gives me a detailed update of the time I spend not just on different websites on the internet but on applications on my computer, allowing me to track exactly how much time I spend working (or not working) on a project, and it shows me what could be distracting usage.

Cons

I think it should have some sort of default profiles you can load. For example, if you are a digital content manager, your initial report will most likely show you as being highly distracted and rate your productivity very low until you change and manually mark what is productive and what is not.

“RescueTime

Pros

It judges my performance with no bias; I can feel ashamed or motivated, but at the end of the day, it pushes me to improve my workflow and get more value from my time.

Cons

I have not stumbled upon any issues or errors. My only concern is that I am not sure where they use the collected data.

“Interesting Tool but doesn't always work

Pros

It is automated, I just install it and forget about it. It is easy to see how productive I am and set goals.

Cons

Sometimes it does not detect activity when its happening, skewing my results. Sometimes its not very good at identifying the nature of programs, and I have privacy concerns.

“Time management for the team

Pros

This software worked well for myself and other team members to get a good idea of how we are spending our time. It helps with accountability as long as everyone is on the same page about sharing their own time use. This gives us a good idea of how we are spending our time and provides insight into any changes we did like to make.

Cons

No big cons for me. The usefulness of the software decreases after I have gained the initial insights.

“This is a great productivity tool

Pros

It is simple and fast to set up, use, and analyze the time usage.

Cons

Nothing, I think this is a perfect tool.

“Bought This After Hearing About It From Tim Ferris...

Pros

Like any productivity tool, I subscribed because I wanted to hold myself more accountable and analyze the applications and websites I visit from day to day. Its been amazing to see how much time I am going through my emails and adjust based on how I want to make my workflow more productive. I love that the product is simple enough to set up and monitor my computer usage without any manual processes.

Cons

I think the tool is available without many videos or sources on how to get the most out of RescueTime. I am still finding new ways to incorporate this into my workflow, though.

“Consistently great, but dangerous for managers

Pros

It provides a great little nudge to remind me that when I am on my computer working, I should be, like, working... The free offering is excellent, allowing me to do a semi-deep dive into my data, seeing what I am doing most, and helping me improve.

Cons

THE software is great, and the portal too, but I worry about this sort of thing getting into the hands of (bad) developer managers who might use it to spy on their employees, firing the least "productive" ones. Truly, everyone needs a break now and then, so it worries me that this powerful program could fall into the wrong hands. "With great power comes great responsibility," that sort of thing. Another thing is the feature set has not changed much in recent years. Subtle improvements could go a long way. For instance, I wish it could help me fill in my timesheet each week. Imagine if it could tell me which solutions I have open most often in VS Code, for example, and I could charge my time to each project.

“Slightly underwhelming

Pros

This software picks up a lot of useful data and allows me to quickly see what things I do on the computer and how the trends flow during my day or week. There is a lot of good information; it is simple to install and use generally, and overall its a decent experience.

Cons

I can not really customize things without a lot of tedium in the categories and other areas. Also, the ability to change tracked sections of the day or week is somewhat limited, there are only one or two generic filters for declaring which days and hours to run the tracking. I have realized that the categories are geared mostly toward organizations more than individuals. If I customize categories to make a certain activity productive time instead of distracted time, it wont let me change just that one activity to be productive without bringing the entire category along with it.

“Great tool to track your attention habits

Pros

RescueTime tracks the time I spend in all my applications. It is a good tool to track my habits, as I see which applications I have used the most. After using this, I have a report on where my attention went during the day. If I have never done the exercise of auditing myself, I give RescueTime a chance.

Cons

I do not agree with the concept of tracking productivity. I believe that the fact that you use an application will not tell you if you are more productive, as this tool (or any other) cannot measure the value that you produce. Its worse with the organizations version available, where managers can see the aggregate time of their employees. But I still find it useful if I am struggling with my attention and think its going somewhere it should not.

“A great way to see how you spend your day

Pros

The best thing about RescueTime is that I do not have to do any manual logging of time or tasks; it is all automatic! This allows me to look back and get an idea of how I spend my time and how I can spend it better. Also, in a pinch, I have used this data to help fill in when I forget to manually start or stop my time tracking app for billing clients.

Cons

I did not like that when I want to look at reports of my time, I get sent to a dashboard on the web. I would prefer to have everything happen in the desktop app.

“Super valuable software to reclaim your time

Pros

It has made my time on the computer totally transparent. As a goals-driven person, seeing how productive I am and how much unproductive time there is makes a massive difference to how much I get done each day.

Cons

It is unfortunate that the iOS app is not currently functional, but I believe thats Apples doing. Otherwise, the freemium version gives me plenty of reasons to use this app every day.

“Interesting productivity stats

Pros

I think after realizing how much time I am unproductive, it will make me more productive.

Cons

I do not have anything bad to say about this.

“Finally understand how you spend your time in front of your computer

Pros

This software automatically track and cleverly report how I am spending time in front of my computer and how often I get interrupted and switch activities. I am still using the basic functionalities of the software and plan to explore more.

Cons

I think it would be useful if I could add a note to mark a certain activity.

“Useful but dated

Pros

It gives me an accurate view of how I spend my time on the computer. There are lots of additional features with the premium plan.

Cons

I dislike that the tools design has not been updated in years. It looks like it was made in the early 2000s.

“Interesting look at time management

Pros

I started using RescueTime out of curiosity. I wanted to see what my work habits looked like, but after a while, it just became a useful tool to track how I spent my time. I was able to find out when I did my most productive work, and very clear patterns of breaks and slumps emerged. I only ever used the free version, but that was adequate for tracking my research time online and helped me break a few bad habits.

Cons

I did this to myself, but I can see how an employee might not like their boss constantly looking over their shoulder with this.

“The tool of champions!

Pros

RescueTime is an absolutely brilliant time tracking tool. It has given me a very simple but accurate tool for tracking exactly how much time I spend on projects. It's brilliant because it tracks time by app but also by websites visited. So, I can include research time and reading time into the time I spend on projects. It tracks multiple devices, which is great because I tend to switch between devices when working on projects.

Cons

It would be great if I could set up project and task tracking within the app so I can group my activities.

“Keeps me honest with screen time

Pros

Each week I take the report and show it to my accountability group, with the goal of decreasing my computer time week by week. RescueTime makes it very easy to track and spot trends.

Cons

I cannot think of any cons. Once I categorized all of my different applications and activities, it worked well.