Comparison

Employee Desk as a Hubstaff alternative

Hubstaff is a mature, well-built global time tracking platform. The reasons to look at Employee Desk are specific: attendance and leave in the same system as tracking, or being invoiced in rupees.

  • 7-day trial
  • No keystroke logging
  • INR pricing published

What each product is

Employee Desk

Employee management with time tracking attached

Attendance, leave, holidays, employee records, projects, tasks and daily work reports, with an optional desktop time tracker on top. Available as a cloud subscription. Built in India, priced in rupees.

  • Attendance and leave are core, not an add-on
  • Per-user pricing: pay only for active employees; admins are free
  • No keystroke content is ever recorded
  • Employees see everything recorded about them
Hubstaff

A global time tracking and workforce platform

Hubstaff is a cloud time tracking product with strong roots in remote and distributed teams. Its centre of gravity is time tracking, activity measurement, GPS and mobile tracking for field teams, plus payroll and invoicing built around tracked hours.

  • Cloud only — there is no self-hosted edition
  • Large native integration catalogue
  • Payroll and invoicing based on tracked time
  • Mobile apps with GPS and geofencing

Feature comparison

Compared on facts that can be checked from public documentation. Where something is genuinely unclear it is marked rather than guessed at.

Employee Desk compared with Hubstaff
Employee DeskHubstaff
DeploymentCloudCloud (SaaS)
Attendance with shifts and late policyYesTime tracking rather than an attendance register
Leave management with accrual and balancesYesTime off requests; policy depth differs
Holiday calendarYesVaries by plan
Desktop trackerWindows, macOS, UbuntuWindows, macOS, Linux, plus mobile
Mobile app with GPSNoYes
ScreenshotsOptional, randomised, employee-visibleYes, configurable
Keystroke content loggingNeverNot recorded; activity counted
Employee sees own screenshotsYesDepends on configuration
Payroll processingMonthly payroll with payslips and PF/ESI/PTYes
Invoicing and client billingHours export; no invoicing moduleYes
IntegrationsCSV and XLSX exports; no public API yetLarge native integration catalogue
Currency and invoicingINR with GSTUSD
Support timezoneIST, with on-site visits in North IndiaGlobal, primarily US hours

Check Hubstaff’s own site before you decide. Last checked against Hubstaff’s public pages on 8 October 2026. Software changes. Everything on this page is written from Hubstaff’s public documentation and pricing pages at the time of writing, we do not restate their prices here because they move, and we correct this page when we are told it is wrong. If you find something inaccurate, email contact@digitalgeniussolution.com and we will fix it.

Where Hubstaff may be stronger

Written plainly, because a comparison page that finds no fault with itself is not worth reading.

01

Integrations

Hubstaff has a considerably larger catalogue of native integrations with project management, accounting and payroll tools. We have CSV and XLSX exports, and no public API or webhooks yet.

02

Mobile and GPS tracking

If you have field staff, drivers or site engineers and you need GPS and geofencing, Hubstaff does that and Employee Desk does not. This is a genuine gap rather than a positioning choice.

03

Payroll and invoicing

Hubstaff can pay contractors from tracked hours and raise client invoices. Employee Desk runs monthly payroll for employees but has no contractor payouts or client invoicing.

04

Product maturity

A larger company, a longer track record and a bigger public review base. If procurement wants an established international vendor with thousands of published reviews, that is a real advantage.

05

Global footprint

Multi-currency billing, regional data centres and support across time zones. If your team is spread across four continents, that infrastructure matters.

Which should you choose?

Choose Employee Desk if

  • You need attendance and leave management, not just time tracking.
  • You are an Indian company and want INR pricing with GST invoices.
  • Your team will accept a tracker only if it is visibly transparent.
  • You want per-user pricing where admins are free.

Choose Hubstaff if

  • You need GPS and mobile tracking for field teams.
  • You want payroll and client invoicing driven by tracked hours in the same product.
  • You depend on native integrations with tools you already run.
  • You are a globally distributed team needing multi-currency and multi-region support.
  • Procurement requires an established vendor with a large public review base.

Pricing

We do not restate Hubstaff’s prices here because they change; check their pricing page directly. Our cloud plans are published in rupees, priced per active user per month plus 18% GST.

Cloud

Starter

Core HR, shifts and chat

₹59 / user / month

+ 18% GST

  • Employee records
  • Attendance
  • Leave management
  • Holiday calendar
  • Custom roles & permissions
  • Organization settings
  • Session control
  • Shifts & roster
  • Team chat
Start 7-day free trial
Cloud · most chosen

Growth

Projects, tasks, work reports, timesheets and activity tracking

₹99 / user / month

+ 18% GST

  • Everything in Starter, plus:
  • Projects
  • Tasks
  • Daily work reports
  • Timesheets
  • Desktop time tracker (hours, active/idle)
Start 7-day free trial
Cloud

Pro

Screenshots, live productivity, planning, payroll and audit

₹149 / user / month

+ 18% GST

  • Everything in Growth, plus:
  • Screenshots, live board & retention
  • Live screen capture, day timeline, browser tab history, top apps & pages, screenshots
  • Productivity insights
  • Workforce planning
  • Payroll
  • Audit log
Start 7-day free trial

Prices exclude 18% GST. Billed monthly per active user.

Need an on-premise deployment? Contact sales. Full detail on the pricing page, and a cost comparison on the cost page.

Frequently asked questions

Can Hubstaff be self-hosted?

No. Hubstaff is a cloud product and does not offer a self-hosted edition. Need an on-premise deployment? Contact sales.

Does Employee Desk import Hubstaff data?

There is no built-in importer. Employees and projects are set up in the portal, and historical time entries and screenshots do not migrate.

Does Hubstaff log keystrokes?

Hubstaff measures activity from keyboard and mouse input rather than recording what is typed, which is the same approach Employee Desk takes. Neither product is a keylogger.

Is Employee Desk cheaper than Hubstaff?

It depends on headcount and plan, and the honest answer is on the cost comparison page. Cloud is priced per active user per month (plans from ₹59 per user/month + GST); admins are free.

Do you have a mobile app with GPS?

No. If you need field-staff GPS tracking, Hubstaff is the better product for that requirement and we would rather say so than sell you something that does not do it.

Run both for a week

A 7-day trial with your real team is a better comparison than any table. Install the tracker on two machines and look at what the reports actually say.

  • 7-day trial
  • No credit card
  • Cancel anytime