Harvest vs Kimai

Fit:

Migration notes

Overlapping project timesheets, reporting and invoicing support a partial alternative. No Harvest-specific importer verified; CSV/JSON importer or API mapping required. Expense management requires paid plugin; accounting and payment integrations need separate assessment.

Sources: www.kimai.org, www.kimai.org, www.getharvest.com · checked 2026-10-21

HarvestPaid incumbent

Entry priceUSD 9 / seat / month

Pricing modelmixed, billed annual

OwnerBending Spoons S.p.A.; NASDAQ:BSP

Teams starts USD9/seat/month billed annually (USD108/year); USD11 monthly. Additional invoices, projects, clients and tasks can incur usage charges; free plan available. Source

Harvest plans reviewed
Teams	entry	USD 11 / seat / mo
Enterprise	business	USD 17.50 / seat / mo
Enterprise Plus	enterprise	Quote only

KimaiOpen-source alternative

Fit for Harvest

License

GNU Affero General Public License v3.0 Permissions of this strongest copyleft license are conditioned on making available complete source code of licensed works and modifications, which include larger works using a licensed work, under the same license. Copyright and license notices must be preserved. Contributors provide an express grant of patent rights. When a modified version is used to provide a service over a network, the complete source code of the modified version must be made available. May Commercial useModificationDistributionPatent usePrivate use Must License and copyright noticeState changesDisclose sourceNetwork use is distributionSame license No LiabilityWarranty Summary from GitHub's choosealicense.com

Paid-feature tier C

Self-host

Paid-feature limits3 noted

Kimai plans reviewed
Self-hosted core	free self-hosted core	Free
Professional	vendor commercial cloud	USD 4.99 / user / mo
Professional	vendor commercial cloud	USD 4.99 / user / mo

What you may give up

Expense management plugin
Task planning plugin
Custom fields plugin

Tier C: AGPL-v3 self-hosted core; paid plugins add everyday expenses, task planning and custom fields. Core already provides time tracking, reports and invoicing. First-party Kimai Cloud verified separately. License source

What running it takes

PHP8.2+ and required extensions

Hover or focus an icon for its name. Dashed means not established; struck through means no; grouped icons are alternatives.

Current Kimai2 requirements from maintained README and installation guide. No SQLite alternative. Native PHP route or Docker; external database remains required. Old1.14 docs list third-party one-click providers but current official installer no longer endorses them, so no shortcut asserted. Infrastructure and staff time are not priced here; this page does not compare total cost.