Everhour
Time tracking, estimates, budgets, expenses, and invoices for project tools
Everhour's solo core is compact: build a private time + budget tracking ledger that imports user-supplied CSV files, categorizes entries, reconciles balances, and exports reports. A competent builder can reach a useful personal version in one sitting, while the paid product mainly wins on banking, compliance, trust.
Build verification: not recorded. How we judge buildability
What you give up
- bank, payment, tax, and reconciliation integrations
- live bank feeds and payment rails
- tax and accounting rule updates
- audited security and recovery
- multi-user controls and accountant workflows
Why people still pay
Everhour: People pay because errors touch real money. Bank connections, reconciliation, tax changes, evidence, security, and support are the product.
Your build guide
The stack, security requirements, and agent rules for a focused replacement.
Before you start
- Runtime and tools: TypeScript, React, Node, SQLite and decimal.js for explicit decimal calculations.
- Before starting: A representative CSV with known totals, currency and date conventions, and an agreed calculation specification.
Use these project rules and optional skill references alongside the prompt. Review each skill before adding it to your agent; the AGENTS.md export includes the same guidance.
Project rule — domain: Store Project, Task, TimeEntry, RatePeriod and Budget; only one timer runs per user, and billed entries retain their applied rate rather than using today's rate.
Project rule — scope and recovery: First deliver manual/timer entry and CSV export. Browser-extension integrations and payroll are separate; imported entries need duplicate review and an audit trail for corrections.
Project rule — acceptance: Stop a timer after changing the project rate and cross a midnight boundary; the report follows the chosen rate policy and duration without double-counting either day.
Project rule — delivery: document real setup commands and permissions; do not claim a build, accuracy level, performance result or security certification that has not been demonstrated.
Recommended skill: web-design-guidelines — review keyboard access, focus, validation, error recovery and the readable work/review interface or HTML report. Follow the maintainer's installation instructions and match its requirements to the chosen runtime.
Recommended skill: sharp-edges — review configuration and API defaults against the app-specific invariants and recovery boundaries above; this is not a security certification. Follow the maintainer's installation instructions and match its requirements to the chosen runtime.
Implementation plan
Phase 1
Pin the working slice and create its example input: Log time against project tasks, mark entries billable, apply historical rates and show remaining hours or budget for each client project. Confirm setup: A representative CSV with known totals, currency and date conventions, and an agreed calculation specification.
Phase 2
Implement persistence and write-time invariants before decorating the UI: Store Project, Task, TimeEntry, RatePeriod and Budget; only one timer runs per user, and billed entries retain their applied rate rather than using today's rate.
Phase 3
Connect the working view to real saved state. Preserve imported source rows and units, use decimal arithmetic with stated rounding, and retain correction history. Missing values are unknown rather than zero; reports describe records and assumptions rather than giving advice.
Phase 4
Expose the app-specific limits and recovery path in context: First deliver manual/timer entry and CSV export. Browser-extension integrations and payroll are separate; imported entries need duplicate review and an audit trail for corrections.
Phase 5
Walk through this concrete acceptance case and preserve its exported evidence: Stop a timer after changing the project rate and cross a midnight boundary; the report follows the chosen rate policy and duration without double-counting either day. Finish the README and backup/restore instructions; report unfinished capabilities explicitly.
Build the following focused alternative to Everhour. Implement the focused workflow below first; the verdict is not evidence of a completed or production-certified build. WORKING SLICE Log time against project tasks, mark entries billable, apply historical rates and show remaining hours or budget for each client project. SETUP AND ARCHITECTURE Use TypeScript, React, Node, SQLite and decimal.js for explicit decimal calculations. Prerequisites: A representative CSV with known totals, currency and date conventions, and an agreed calculation specification. Before integrating anything, record actual versions and permissions, plus model files or provider limits only where used, in the README; make unavailable dependencies visible rather than simulating success. DOMAIN MODEL AND INVARIANTS Store Project, Task, TimeEntry, RatePeriod and Budget; only one timer runs per user, and billed entries retain their applied rate rather than using today's rate. IMPLEMENTATION CONTRACT Preserve imported source rows and units, use decimal arithmetic with stated rounding, and retain correction history. Missing values are unknown rather than zero; reports describe records and assumptions rather than giving advice. Provide an input/setup view, the main work view, and a review/export view appropriate to this workflow. Preserve the last saved state if a job or save fails. Include empty, loading, permission-denied, partial and retryable-error states. Log identifiers and error categories without secret values or unnecessary private content. APP-SPECIFIC BOUNDARY AND RECOVERY First deliver manual/timer entry and CSV export. Browser-extension integrations and payroll are separate; imported entries need duplicate review and an audit trail for corrections. ACCEPTANCE SCENARIO Stop a timer after changing the project rate and cross a midnight boundary; the report follows the chosen rate policy and duration without double-counting either day. Also reopen the app after an interrupted operation, confirm the saved record/export remains inspectable, and document the recovery action. These are implementation acceptance requirements, not a claim that this guide has been tested. DELIVERY Deliver a runnable repository with migrations or project-format versioning, a non-sensitive example, environment/permission setup, the exact manual acceptance steps, and a backup/export-and-restore walkthrough. Implement the working slice before optional integrations; list any deferred paid-product capabilities honestly. Do not add capabilities outside the working slice just to resemble the original product. PROJECT RULES FOR AGENTS.md Keep the domain invariants above executable at the write boundary. Propose scope changes before adding providers or permissions. Never fabricate source evidence, publish results, identity matches or successful delivery. Preserve user originals and require an explicit confirmation for destructive changes or external publication.
$ open in your agent (prompt prefilled, you press enter), copy the prompt or copy or download AGENTS.md
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Alternatives to building your own
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Everhour pricing
| plan | monthly | annual (per mo) | what you get |
|---|---|---|---|
| free | $0/user | $0/user | Up to 5 users; time tracking, projects, tasks, reports, and export; 0 project-management integrations |
| team | $10/user | $8.50/user | Minimum 5 paid seats; unlimited seats; integrations, estimates, budgets, expenses, invoicing, and SSO |
| custom | — | — | For 50+ users; custom commercial and support termsQuote required. |
free tier5 users; time tracking, projects, tasks, reports, and export; 0 integrations
billingmonthly + annual (annual rate is 15% lower); 14-day Team trial
hidden costsTeam has a 5-seat minimum, making the minimum bill $50/month or $42.50/month at the annual rate. Purchased seat count is not automatically reduced when a user is removed; annual unused time is non-refundable.
pricing sources checked 2026-08-10 · pricing source ↗
Questions about Everhour
Can you build your own Everhour with AI?
The verdict is yes for the scoped workflow. Everhour's solo core is compact: build a private time + budget tracking ledger that imports user-supplied CSV files, categorizes entries, reconciles balances, and exports reports. A competent builder can reach a useful personal version in one sitting, while the paid product mainly wins on banking, compliance, trust.
What does the Everhour build prompt cover?
The prompt starts with this scope: Log time against project tasks, mark entries billable, apply historical rates and show remaining hours or budget for each client project. Full-product capabilities excluded from the comparison include: bank, payment, tax, and reconciliation integrations; live bank feeds and payment rails; tax and accounting rule updates. Follow the implementation plan and its prerequisites before expanding the build.
How do I use the prompt, AGENTS.md and agent skills?
Start with the Everhour prerequisites and stack, then copy the prompt into your coding agent. Save the project rules as AGENTS.md in the project root. Linked skills are optional packages or source instructions for specific tasks; review their current contents and install only those matching the chosen stack. A skill does not supply API credentials or verify the finished app.
How long will this Everhour project take?
The catalogue estimate is one sitting for the limited scope. Setup, integration approvals, debugging, deployment and ongoing maintenance can add time. This is an estimate, not a delivery guarantee.
What would I give up by replacing Everhour?
bank, payment, tax, and reconciliation integrations; live bank feeds and payment rails; tax and accounting rule updates; audited security and recovery; multi-user controls and accountant workflows. Everhour: People pay because errors touch real money. Bank connections, reconciliation, tax changes, evidence, security, and support are the product.
What price is this guide comparing against?
The recorded Team plan is $10/mo per seat (per user per month), checked 2026-07-31. Check the linked pricing source before buying. Building your own also has hosting, API and maintenance costs; the recorded amount is not a guaranteed saving.
What can I use instead of building Everhour?
Kimai: Time, budgets, expenses, invoices and an API; project-tool integrations are thinner than Everhour's. Invoice Ninja self-hosted: Time, tasks, quotes, expenses and invoices for free on your server; deep project-tool integrations do not follow. Check each option's license, hosting needs and feature limits.