The fastest way to lose your billable hours is to keep them in someone else's cloud.
DockTodo vs Toggl
A local-first alternative for freelancers who bill by the hour — billable rates and the timer are free, and your entries live on your own machine.
If you're here, you probably hit the rate wall — or lost an entry
Toggl keeps billable rates — the one feature an hourly freelancer literally cannot invoice without — behind a $9/month (billed annually) wall. And its own documentation warns that unsynced entries can be lost. For work you intend to bill, "the rate is a paid add-on" and "the record depends on a sync" are two versions of the same risk: the thing you rely on isn't fully in your hands.
Toggl is genuinely good — at something else
To be fair: Toggl has excellent cross-platform apps, a slick one-tap timer, and polished reporting that teams love. If you want native apps on every device and rich dashboards, it's a strong tool. DockTodo takes a narrower bet: one person, hourly billing, a single private record from timer to invoice — with rates included and no sync to trust.
Where DockTodo wins for a solo hourly biller
| What matters to a freelancer | DockTodo | Toggl |
|---|---|---|
| Billable rates | Free, built in | Paid tier ($9/mo) |
| Your data lives on… | your own device | their cloud |
| Entries can be lost to a sync | No sync to lose | Warned in their docs |
| Works fully offline | Yes | Limited |
| Account required | None | Yes |
| Timer → invoice | One tool, one click | Export to invoice elsewhere |
| Anything uploaded | Nothing | Everything |
This table only lists what a solo hourly freelancer cares about. Toggl does more on native apps and team reporting — if you need those, it's the better fit, honestly.
The right question isn't "which does more today?"
It's "who owns your data and your hours a year from now?" A cloud plan can move rates behind a wall or change what sync keeps — and the answer changes without you. A local-first app can't: the free tier never shrinks because there's no server bill that could ever force it to, and your records are a plain JSON file you can read and take anywhere.
Bring your Toggl history in one click
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Export a detailed report from Toggl.
In Toggl Track, export your detailed report as CSV — the format with one row per time entry.
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Import it into DockTodo.
Open DockTodo, click Import, and choose the file. It detects the Toggl format and maps clients, projects, durations and tags automatically. Some project mappings may need a quick review — you'll see a preview before anything is added.
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Confirm, and you're tracking locally.
Review the preview, confirm, and your history is in — on your device, ready to invoice. One click undoes it if you change your mind.
Choose the one that fits how you actually work
Choose DockTodo if you bill by the hour and want your data — and your rates — on your own machine. Choose Toggl if you want native apps across a team and rich shared reporting. No hard feelings either way — this is an honest fork, not a takedown.
The free local app is live today and its feature list never shrinks — a published commitment, not a promotion.