Guide · Time tracking
Manufacturing Time Tracking Software: Track Labor Costs Across Production
Labor is typically 20-35% of manufacturing costs, yet many shops track time with paper timecards or honor-system clock-ins. Accurate time tracking, by job, work order, and production step, transforms labor from a vague cost pool into actionable data for pricing, scheduling, and efficiency improvement.
Why Manufacturing Needs Job-Level Time Tracking
Knowing total labor hours tells you almost nothing. You need to know labor per job, per operation, per machine. Which jobs are profitable? Where are bottlenecks? Which operators are most efficient on which equipment? Job-level time tracking answers these questions.
Job Costing Accuracy
Accurate job costing requires accurate labor allocation. When workers track time to specific jobs or work orders, you know the true cost of each order, not just materials and overhead, but actual labor consumed. This drives better quoting and identifies unprofitable work.
Production Scheduling
Historical time data improves scheduling accuracy. If you know a particular operation takes 2.3 hours on average for your team, you can schedule realistically. Without data, you're guessing, and usually underestimating.
Efficiency Improvement
Time tracking reveals inefficiencies. Setup taking too long on certain machines? Particular operations consuming more labor than quoted? Operators with significantly different performance on the same tasks? Data makes improvement possible.
Key Features for Manufacturing
Work Order Integration
Time entries should link directly to work orders or job numbers from your ERP or job shop system. Workers select or scan jobs when starting work; time automatically associates with the correct order for costing.
Operation/Step Tracking
Beyond job-level, track time by operation or routing step. Setup vs. run time. Machining vs. assembly vs. finishing. This granularity reveals where time actually goes within each job.
Shop Floor Interface
Shop floor workers need rugged, simple interfaces, touchscreens, barcode scanners, or kiosk stations. Complex software gets ignored. The best manufacturing time systems are designed for gloved hands and production environments.
Machine Time vs. Labor Time
Distinguish operator time from machine run time. A CNC job might require 15 minutes of setup and monitoring for 2 hours of machine run time. Both need tracking for accurate costing and scheduling.
Indirect Time Categories
Not all labor is directly billable to jobs. Maintenance, training, meetings, cleanup, these indirect hours need tracking too, both for complete labor accounting and to understand true productive capacity.
Best Time Tracking Software for Manufacturing
Katana
Katana offers manufacturing-specific ERP with built-in time tracking. Shop floor app for clocking onto tasks, real-time production visibility, and integration with inventory and sales orders. Strong for small to mid-size manufacturers.
Best for: Manufacturers wanting integrated ERP with native time tracking and production scheduling.
JobBOSS²
JobBOSS² (from ECI) is purpose-built for job shops. Deep time tracking at the operation level, shop floor data collection, and robust job costing. Mature product with strong integration to quoting and scheduling.
Best for: Job shops and make-to-order manufacturers needing deep operation-level tracking.
Fishbowl Manufacturing
Fishbowl adds manufacturing capabilities to QuickBooks environments. Work order tracking, labor time capture, and inventory management. Less depth than dedicated manufacturing systems but integrates with existing accounting.
Best for: Smaller manufacturers using QuickBooks who need work order time tracking.
Malleable
Malleable pairs a one-tap timer with the calendar you already run your day on. For manufacturing supervisors and office staff who schedule production blocks, meetings, and planning sessions, you start a timer when the work begins and assign it to the right bucket, and your tracked time sits right next to your schedule. Pairs well with shop floor systems for complete coverage.
Best for: Manufacturing supervisors and planners whose work is heavily scheduled rather than shop-floor based.
Implementation Considerations
Start with Key Operations
Don't try to track every minute on day one. Start with high-value jobs or bottleneck operations. Prove value, build habits, then expand. Perfect is the enemy of good in manufacturing time tracking.
Shop Floor Buy-In
Workers may resist time tracking as surveillance. Frame it as data for improvement, better scheduling, less overtime, identifying issues. Involve operators in setup and address concerns directly. Resistance kills adoption.
Data Quality Focus
Bad data is worse than no data. Review time entries regularly. Follow up on anomalies. Build feedback loops so workers know their data matters and is being used. Quality comes from attention.
Related Articles
Track production planning time.
Malleable keeps a one-tap timer right next to the calendar you already run your day on. Start it for a planning session or supplier call, assign it to the right bucket, and your tracked time sits alongside your schedule.