The Timebutler alternative with project time and a native app
Timebutler covers holiday, time tracking and the personnel file. MetronHR adds project time with clients and budgets, client allowances, onboarding workflows and apps for iOS and Android.
All information about Timebutler comes from the official provider pages. As at:2. September 2026.
Features in detail
| Feature | MetronHR | Timebutler |
|---|---|---|
| Traffic-light account (warning levels with an automatic alert) | ~1 | |
| Working-time models (part-time, flexitime, trust-based working time) | ~2 | |
| Project time tracking / budgets | 3 | |
| Allowances / hour packages | 4 | |
| Onboarding and offboarding workflows | 5 | |
| Hosting operator without a US parent company | 6 | ~7 |
| Mobile app | ~8 | |
| API | 9 | 10 |
Sources and notes (10)
- 1. Timebutler, Traffic-light account (warning levels with an automatic alert): Timebutler has overtime management and allows clear limits for overtime, holiday and absences. Whether reaching a limit is reported automatically and whether there are several levels for it is not clear from the product page (timebutler.de, retrieved 14 September 2026).
- 2. Timebutler, Working-time models (part-time, flexitime, trust-based working time): Absence types, limits and approval routes can be defined freely. Working-time models for flexitime, trust-based working time or alternating weekly patterns are not named as a separate feature on the website.
- 3. Timebutler, Project time tracking / budgets: Timebutler records working time, not project time. Clients, projects, activities, budgets and hourly rates are not listed as features on the website.
- 4. Timebutler, Allowances / hour packages: Limits for overtime and absences can be set. Client-bound hour packages with renewal and carry-over are not provided for.
- 5. Timebutler, Onboarding and offboarding workflows: The pricing page lists working time recording, holiday and overtime management, the personnel file, shift planning, reports and a time clock terminal. A joining or leaving process with tasks, owners and deadlines is not in it (timebutler.de/preise, retrieved 3 September 2026).
- 6. MetronHR, Hosting operator without a US parent company: The operator is Hetzner Online GmbH, a German company with no US parent. This marketing website is hosted with Vercel, Inc. (USA) in the Frankfurt region, where no employee data is processed.
- 7. Timebutler, Hosting operator without a US parent company: Timebutler names the data centre near Frankfurt am Main, but does not name the operator. The policy states that the service provider only supplies infrastructure and does not access the data.
- 8. Timebutler, Mobile app: The application is optimised for phones and tablets („optimised for every device“). A native app in the App Store or on Google Play is not named on the website; in OMR reviews the lack of a native app is named as a drawback.
- 9. MetronHR, API: The open REST API v1 is part of the Professional plan: readable are employees, departments, clients, services, projects, time entries, absences and published shifts, while clients, services, projects, time entries and absences can be changed, each secured by keys with permissions per resource. Outgoing webhooks and the MCP server for AI assistants also belong to Professional. Sign-in via Microsoft Entra ID comes with every plan. Further integrations are agreed individually in the Enterprise offer.
- 10. Timebutler, API: No open interface is documented on the website. For sign-in there is single sign-on via third-party providers.
~ = available with limits, the notes are below the table. – = no verified information is available for this provider on this feature. That is not a no: we only record a negative where we can cite a source.
An overview of which features exist at all, regardless of plan. The price-performance comparison is on the pricing page, the individual features in detail under Features.
Feature comparison as at September 2026. Information about competitors comes from publicly available sources, in each case the official provider pages with the date retrieved, and can change. Timebutler is a trademark of its respective owner.
MetronHR is also available as a native app for iOS and Android:
Where the data sits
Server location and operator are two different questions. A data centre in Germany does not remove the data from US law: providers with a US parent company fall under the CLOUD Act and the surveillance powers of FISA 702, regardless of where the servers stand. Microsoft's chief legal officer in France testified under oath before the French Senate's committee of inquiry on 10 June 2025 that he could not guarantee that data from European data centres would not go to US authorities (record of the Sénat). That is why both are shown side by side here, each with the source it comes from.
What is compared is what the provider documents for its own application, not the infrastructure of its marketing website. More about our own hosting is in the Trust Center.
MetronHR
- Server location of the application
- Hetzner Online GmbH, Nuremberg and Falkenstein. All servers stand exclusively in Germany.
- Operator and legal jurisdiction
- Hetzner Online GmbH, a German company with no US parent and therefore beyond the reach of the CLOUD Act and FISA 702. No US provider sits in the data path for the application.
- Processors outside Germany
- None for the application. Payment is handled by Stripe Payments Europe (Ireland). This marketing website is hosted with Vercel, Inc. (USA, Frankfurt region), and analytics run through PostHog Cloud EU and the reverse proxy cdn.metronhr.de with a Cloudflare edge. No employee data is processed there.
- Source
- MetronHR privacy policyAs at 08/2026
Timebutler
- Server location of the application
- A secured high-performance data centre near Frankfurt am Main, Germany. Timebutler undertakes that the data stays within the scope of the GDPR and backs up to a separate server every 24 hours.
- Operator and legal jurisdiction
- Not named. The privacy policy states that the data centre provider supplies only computing capacity, internet connectivity and storage and does not access personal data. The provider is Timebutler GmbH in Schönefeld.
- Processors outside Germany
- None named for the application. For payments the policy lists Deutsche Bank AG (SEPA), PayPal (Europe) S.à r.l. in Luxembourg and Stripe Payments Europe in Ireland, plus Google, Microsoft and Slack for the website and operations.
- Source
- Timebutler data protection and securityabgerufen 02.09.2026
All information comes from the providers' publicly available privacy policies and security pages, and the date retrieved is on every card. Providers can change their infrastructure and their processors at any time. The adequacy decision on the EU-US Data Privacy Framework still applies, but is under legal challenge.
What MetronHR does better
Project time with client, budget and hourly rate
Timebutler answers who worked when and who is absent when. It does not answer what was worked on or whether the client's budget still holds. Anyone billing services keeps that calculation alongside in Excel. MetronHR books every hour against client, project and activity, stores hourly rates, shows budget usage as a traffic light and prepares the invoice.
A native app instead of a mobile website
Timebutler is optimised for phones and tablets, so a website that adapts. The provider names no app in the App Store or on Google Play, and in OMR reviews exactly that comes up as a drawback. For teams at a desk that is enough. For field work, the workshop and the building site the difference is noticeable: the MetronHR app starts without a browser, remembers the sign-in, clocks in with one tap and reports approvals as a push notification.
Joining and leaving as a workflow
Timebutler knows approval routes for requests, but no process for joining and leaving. The contract, access, equipment, mandatory instruction and probation review stay on a list outside the system. MetronHR sets these steps up as a reusable workflow, assigns them automatically when someone joins and documents what has been done.
Working-time models per department, side by side in the same business
An office on flexitime, sales on trust-based working time, a warehouse on shifts: those are three different target-hours logics in one company. MetronHR stores models at day, week and month level, as a default for the whole company and differing per person, each linked to the overtime account and holiday entitlement. Timebutler does not offer these models as a separate feature.
Price comparison
Timebutler bills per team, MetronHR per user. The comparison therefore depends on team size, not on the plan name.
| Service | MetronHR | Timebutler |
|---|---|---|
| 5 people | Team 25 euros a month, so 5 euros per person | Starter 29.95 euros a month, so 5.99 euros per person |
| 20 people | Team 100 euros a month | Team 59.95 euros a month, so 3 euros per person |
| 50 people | Team 250 euros a month | 59.95 euros plus 15 × 1.39 euros, 80.80 euros a month in total |
| Project time with client, budget and hourly rate | included in Professional at 10 euros per user | not available |
| Onboarding workflows and client allowances | included in Professional | not available |
| Trial period | 14 days, no credit card, no sales call | 6 weeks, no credit card |
5 people
- MetronHR
- Team 25 euros a month, so 5 euros per person
- Timebutler
- Starter 29.95 euros a month, so 5.99 euros per person
20 people
- MetronHR
- Team 100 euros a month
- Timebutler
- Team 59.95 euros a month, so 3 euros per person
50 people
- MetronHR
- Team 250 euros a month
- Timebutler
- 59.95 euros plus 15 × 1.39 euros, 80.80 euros a month in total
Project time with client, budget and hourly rate
- MetronHR
- included in Professional at 10 euros per user
- Timebutler
- not available
Onboarding workflows and client allowances
- MetronHR
- included in Professional
- Timebutler
- not available
Trial period
- MetronHR
- 14 days, no credit card, no sales call
- Timebutler
- 6 weeks, no credit card
Prices per timebutler.de/preise, retrieved on 2 September 2026, each plus VAT. Timebutler: Starter up to 5 people 29.95 euros, Team from 6 people 59.95 euros as a fixed price up to 35 people, every additional person 1.39 euros, from 200 people on request. For purely managing working time and holiday, Timebutler is cheaper than MetronHR from around ten people.
No credit card needed · cancellable monthly
FromTimebutler moving to MetronHR
Your data comes with you.Timebutler hands them over as a file, MetronHR reads people, personal data, hours and absences out of it, and before anything is taken over you see row by row what will happen. For a team under thirty people that is a matter of one to two hours, most of it spent putting the file together.
- 1
AtTimebutler export
- Every list view via the Download button as Excel or CSV: absences, holiday accounts, sick notes, working time entries, working time accounts, the user list
- A download centre under Reports for the whole data set
- 2
Load the template and map the columns
The template comes as Excel and as CSV, with a second sheet that states for every column whether it is required, its format, an example and the permitted values. If your file's header row matches, the mapping falls away entirely. Otherwise the assistant proposes the mapping and marks everything that did not match word for word.
- 3
Check, then take it over
The dry run is mandatory and writes nothing. It shows for every row whether it will be created, changed, skipped or rejected, naming the column and the value behind the finding. Only the second click takes it over, in one transaction. The default is "create new ones only", and an empty cell never changes a value that has been maintained.
Export routes fromTimebutler according to Timebutler help, exporting data, retrieved on06.09.2026.
Comes with you
- People, with staff number, work address and employment contract
- Remaining holiday and the overtime balance as an opening value per person
- Departments, clients, services and projects
- Time entries and absences for the current year
- Public holidays, including regions that differ
Does not come with you
- Files from the old personnel file, they are uploaded again
- The history of an hours account, MetronHR starts from the opening value
How the move works in detail, what the dry run shows and why no invitation email goes out with it is set out on the page switching time tracking.
Frequently asked questions
What you need to know about switching from Timebutler to MetronHR.
Timebutler costs 29.95 euros a month up to 5 people and 59.95 euros a month from 6 people, as a fixed price up to 35 people, then 1.39 euros per additional person, each plus VAT. MetronHR costs 5 euros per person on the Team plan. Up to around ten people MetronHR is level or cheaper, above that Timebutler is clearly ahead on price. That price advantage applies to a smaller feature set, though: without project time, without client allowances and without onboarding workflows.
No, not any more at least. That figure circulates in older comparison articles. On Timebutler's pricing page on 2 September 2026 the Starter plan costs 29.95 euros a month for up to five people; only the trial is free there. For five people MetronHR costs 25 euros a month on the Team plan and is cancellable monthly.
By its own account Timebutler runs in a certified data centre near Frankfurt am Main, and the operator is not named. MetronHR runs at Hetzner Online GmbH in Nuremberg and Falkenstein, a German company with no US parent. Both providers therefore keep the data in Germany; with MetronHR the operator is additionally named in the Trust Center.
Project time tracking with clients, projects and activities, project budgets with a target-actual traffic light, client-bound hour packages, onboarding and offboarding workflows, configurable working-time models and native apps for iOS and Android. Timebutler is mature in holiday and absence management and ahead on the fixed price in teams over 35 people; anyone who needs time management, project time and an app on the phone alongside holiday gets that at MetronHR in one plan.
Yes. Timebutler produces reports on working times, absences and overtime and keeps a personnel file with custom fields and documents. From those you carry over master data and holiday and overtime balances into MetronHR. From 30 employees we help with mapping the fields, at no extra charge.
Question not answered here? Every step is explained in the help centre.
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