One click, not a form
A round start/stop button – when you stop, the entry is created automatically. That frictionless flow made Kimai fast.
By the original creator of Kimai
20 years of Kimai
Kimai as it was intended.
Local time tracking and invoices, stripped back to the essentials. No server, no account – your data stays in your browser.
- Open source
- No account
- PDF & XRechnung
From the source
Kimai – the way I originally wanted it.
In 2006, my team and I built the first version of Kimai. In 2009, I handed the project over; since then Kevin Papst has continued it and grown it into a powerful, full-featured platform with an impressive feature set for teams and companies. Read the Kimai history
For me as a solo worker, that is often more than I need. KimaiNext is not a replacement for it – it is my counterpoint for people who work alone: deliberately small, local, without a server and without a login. When there is only you, “less” is often the more practical choice – exactly how I wanted time tracking to feel back then.
— Torsten Höltge, founder of Kimai
No setup
No installation, no database, no hosting. Open it and start.
No cloud
Everything lives in your browser’s localStorage. Nothing leaves your device.
Full control
Back up to JSON, export whenever you need to. Your data belongs to you.
20 Years Later
A Restart.
From the first idea to a deliberate restart – two decades in three steps.
- 2006
Kimai is born
The first version takes shape: lean, fast, and ahead of its time.
- 2009
Handover
The project moves to Kevin Papst and grows over the years into a large platform.
- 2026
Restart
Back to the original idea: local, minimal, honest. KimaiNext.
Why KimaiNext
A principle that worked.
Started in 2006 as a lean browser tool, Kimai grew into the most widely used open-source time tracker. The original idea became a standard. KimaiNext brings back the core that made it work – reduced to what solo workers actually need.
2006 First version – ahead of its time
#1 Open-source time tracking today
20 years A proven core idea
Customer → Project → Activity
Clear assignment without bureaucracy. Reports by day, month, and year almost fall out naturally.
Worked instantly, everywhere
A pure browser tool that worked on every device – “responsive” before the word was common.
The success proves it
A small idea became the leading open-source time tracker. KimaiNext starts there again – with the essentials.
Features
Everything you actually need
From the first click to the final invoice – lean, local, without the ballast.
Projects & customers
Create projects, set hourly rates and customers – the foundation for every invoice.
One-click timer
A round start/stop button. When you stop, a time entry is created automatically.
Manual entries
Add missed time with date, start time, duration, and notes. Edit anything later.
Weekly calendar
Your week in a time grid. Move entries with drag and drop, resize them, or create them directly in the calendar.
Invoices
Turn open entries into a finished PDF invoice – with quarter-hour rounding, logo, and small-business note.
Project budgets
Optional hour or money budgets per project with burn-down bars: green, yellow, red. Ideal for retainers and fixed prices.
Reports & statistics
Revenue, open amounts, and top projects by day, week, month, or year – with a trend chart, no spreadsheet required.
Backup & restore
Save all data as JSON and restore it later, with an optional backup reminder. Older HTML exports are supported too.
Extendable
More when you need it – via plugins
The core stays intentionally small. Specialized workflows can be switched on as plugins and turned off again at any time – still fully local in your browser.
E-invoice (XRechnung)
Create, validate, and view standards-compliant German XRechnung files (UBL 2.1, EN 16931) from any invoice – fully local.
Payment reminders
Spot overdue invoices and generate polite-to-firm reminder letters as PDFs.
Expenses
Record project expenses, mark them as reimbursable, and get reminded when creating an invoice.
Small-business threshold
A German §19 revenue signal: annual revenue against the 25,000 EUR threshold, split into invoiced and open amounts.
Data quality
Checks your data for gaps and inconsistencies and fixes them with targeted one-click corrections.
In three steps
That simple
Open
Open the page. Done. No installation, no account, no server.
Track
Start the timer or add time manually. Everything stays local in your browser.
Invoice
Assign a customer, set the hourly rate, print a PDF invoice or export through the XRechnung plugin.
Ready to take back your time?
Open KimaiNext and record your first entry in under a minute.
Start KimaiNext