Manual time entry
Log time after the fact. Pick a project, type a duration or a start and end time, set the date and billable status, and save. Manual entries are capped at 24 hours.
Didn't run a timer? Log the time by hand. Manual entry is perfect for catching up at the end of the day or recording work you did away from the app.
- Role
- OwnerAdminManagerMember
Anyone can log their own time, including Members. You can only enter time for yourself — reassigning an entry to another person is an Owner/Admin action. See Edit & delete.
Log an entry
Open the form
Click Log time on the timesheet, which opens a drawer, or go
straight to /time/new.
Fill in the details
| Field | Notes |
|---|---|
| Project | Required. The project you worked on. |
| Task | Optional. Pick a task on that project, or leave blank. |
| Date | The day the work happened. |
| Duration | How long you worked. See Duration formats. |
| Start time | Optional. What time you began. |
| End time | Optional. What time you finished. |
| Note | Optional description of what you did. |
| Billable | Whether this time can be invoiced. |
Save
Click Save. The entry appears on your timesheet straight away.
Record when the work happened
A duration tells you how long you worked. Start time and End time tell you when — so a day on your timesheet reads in the order it actually happened.
Both fields are optional, and they work as a pair: fill in both or neither. If you enter only one, you'll see "Enter both a start and an end time, or neither."
They also fill each other in as you type:
- Type a start and an end, and the duration works itself out — 9:00 AM to 10:30 AM is 1h 30m. You don't type the duration at all.
- Already typed a duration and then a start? The end is filled in for you when you leave the field (and the other way around).
- Change the duration afterwards and the end time moves to match.
Typing a time
Type it however feels natural — Hoursmith works out what you meant and shows a short list of suggestions as you go:
| You type | Means |
|---|---|
9 | 9:00 (pick morning or evening from the suggestions) |
9am | 9:00 AM |
9:30 | 9:30 |
930pm or 21:30 | 9:30 PM |
0930 | 9:30 AM |
12am / 12pm | midnight / midday |
Times show in the clock format you prefer (12-hour or 24-hour) — set that under Account preferences.
Work that runs past midnight
If the end time is at or before the start time, Hoursmith reads it as work that ran into the next day and shows "Ends the next day". A 10:00 PM–1:00 AM session is 3 hours, and the entry stays filed on the day the work started.
A start with no end isn't a manual entry — that's a running timer. If you've started work and haven't finished, use the live timer instead. Timers record their start and end automatically.
Whose clock is it?
Times are shown in the timezone of the person who tracked them. A teammate's 9:00 AM start reads as 9:00 AM to everyone on the team, rather than being shifted into your timezone — so you're always looking at the working day they actually had.
Billable default
The Billable toggle follows the project's rate type. On an Hourly project it defaults to billable and can be switched off. On a Fixed fee or Non-billable project it is forced off and read-only: those hours measure effort and never become invoice lines. See Billable vs non-billable.
The 24-hour cap
A single manual entry is capped at 24 hours. If your duration is longer, split the work across separate entries (for example, one per day).
Typing the duration trips you up? Hoursmith accepts 1:30, 1.5h, 90m, and 1h30m. Bare numbers
like 90 on their own are rejected. Full details in
Duration formats.
What happens next
The entry joins your timesheet and counts toward your totals — with the start–end range shown next to the duration if you recorded one. If it's billable and not yet invoiced, it's available the next time you create an invoice for that client.
Troubleshooting
- "Use 1:30, 1.5h, 90m, or 1h30m". Your duration wasn't in an accepted format. See Duration formats.
- "Enter both a start and an end time, or neither". Start and end go together. Add the missing one, or clear both and just enter a duration.
- My entry won't go over a day. Manual entries cap at 24 hours. Split it into multiple entries.
- The entry saved as non-billable unexpectedly. Fixed fee and Non-billable project policy always wins. Use an Hourly project for work that should become a time-based invoice line.
- My older entries don't show a start and end. Only entries that recorded them do — everything logged as a plain duration keeps working exactly as before and simply shows no range. You can add times to any un-invoiced entry by editing it.