DoneThat vs ActivityWatch

The short answer

ActivityWatch is free, open source, local-only, and runs on more platforms than anything else here — including Android. If your requirement is "track what I use, keep it on my machine, cost nothing", it is the correct answer and no paid product beats it on those terms.

What it does not do is interpret. It records which application had focus for how long, accurately. It does not tell you what the work was, whether it mattered, or that you have drifted off the thing you said was important this week. That gap is the only honest argument for paying for anything.

What ActivityWatch gets right

It is genuinely free. MPL-2.0 licensed, no premium tiers, no usage limits, no ads. The optional Pro subscription from $5 a month funds development; it does not unlock anything. That distinction is unusual and worth respecting.

Data never leaves your machine. Local-first as an architecture, not a setting. This is a stronger privacy position than ours and it is the main reason to choose it.

Platform coverage nothing else matches. Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, plus Chrome and Firefox extensions. No commercial tool in this comparison covers Android.

It cannot be taken away. A community project with sustained outside contributions and an open licence does not get acquired and killed. Rewind's users found out in December 2025 what that is worth.

It is extensible. Custom watchers are a documented pattern, so if you want to track something unusual, you can.

What you do yourself

The trade for all of that is interpretation.

ActivityWatch gives you accurate raw data: this app, this window title, this duration. Turning that into "where did my week go and what should I change" means building the layer on top — queries, dashboards, or your own scripts. Plenty of people enjoy that. Plenty of people install it, look at a bar chart of application usage, and never open it again, because a list of apps is not an answer.

There is no AI layer, no categorisation, no summaries, no goals, no nudges, and no team dimension.

What DoneThat adds, specifically

Reconstruction rather than logging. Screen-first capture means the record knows what the work was about, not just which window held it. Untitled — Google Docs and Q3 board deck — Google Docs are different work; to a window-title tracker they are nearly the same signal.

A coach that reaches out. Don nudges you onto goals, blocks calendar time for them, flags low-value work while you can still fix it, checks your mood, reminds you of meetings, suggests breaks.

History AI tools can query. An MCP server and API expose your work history as long-term memory.

A team dimension without surveillance. Summary-level dashboards, relative trends rather than per-person hours, visibility set per summary by the person it belongs to, optional mood tracking.

The capture ask is larger than ActivityWatch's, so precisely: screenshots are never stored — processed in real time, deleted immediately, only derived structured activity persists. Excluded apps are redacted on your machine before anything is sent. With your own Gemini or OpenAI-compatible model, raw activity never reaches our servers. The desktop app is open source, though only the desktop app — ActivityWatch is open source throughout, and that is a real difference, not a technicality.

Platform support

Where ActivityWatch is the better choice

• Cost matters at all. Free, with no catch.
• Nothing may leave your machine. Local-only, verifiable in the source.
• You want Android tracking. Nothing else here does it.
• You want to build your own analysis. Raw data and extensibility are the point.
• You want a tool that cannot be acquired and shut down.
• You enjoy the tinkering. For some people that is a feature, not a cost.

Where DoneThat is the better choice

• You want conclusions, not data. A list of applications is not an answer to "where did my week go?"
• You want to be nudged during the work, not to read a chart afterwards.
• You want goals tracked and something that notices drift.
• You want AI tools to have your work history through MCP and an API.
• You want a team dimension that does not require building one.
• You want peer accountability. Follow others, share summaries, Slack and Discord, accountability groups — all opt-in.
• You do not want a maintenance project. Self-hosted means self-supported.

Can you run both?

You can, and some people do — ActivityWatch as a permanent local archive that is guaranteed to outlive any vendor, DoneThat for the coaching and interpretation. Two capture agents is a real cost in machine resources, so it is a deliberate choice rather than an obvious one.

How we compared these

Everything stated about ActivityWatch comes from its public site, read on 11 August 2026 and linked below. Claims about DoneThat are first-hand: we build it and we charge for it, which is the bias to read this with.

ActivityWatch is free, more open than we are, covers Android, and keeps everything local. Those are genuine advantages and we have not tried to talk around them. The narrow claim we would defend is that raw activity data and an interpreted, coached record are different products — and a lot of people only need the first one.

Questions people ask about ActivityWatch

Is ActivityWatch completely free?

Yes. It is open source under MPL-2.0 with no premium tiers, usage limits or ads. Optional Pro subscriptions from $5 a month exist to fund development, not to unlock features — you are donating, not upgrading.

Does ActivityWatch send my data anywhere?

No. Data stays on your device and the project states it is never sent to any server. That is the strongest privacy position available in this category, stronger than DoneThat's, and it is the main reason to choose it.

What does ActivityWatch not do?

Interpret. It records which application and website had focus and for how long, accurately and locally. It will not categorise your work, summarise your week, set goals, nudge you, or tell you that you drifted off the thing that mattered. Turning its data into insight is your job.

Why pay for DoneThat when ActivityWatch is free?

Only for what it does not do: reconstruction of what the work actually was rather than which window held it, coaching that reaches you during the work, goals, shared team summaries, and an MCP server so AI assistants can query your history. If raw local tracking is your requirement, ActivityWatch is the better answer and it costs nothing.