Asana Timesheets and Budgets: Setup and Pricing

Asana’s Timesheets and Budgets is a paid add-on that layers timesheet logging, approvals, user rates, and project budget tracking onto an existing paid Asana subscription. It costs $5.99 per user per month, billed annually, and can be attached to Starter, Advanced, Enterprise, and Enterprise+ plans. It is not sold on the free Personal tier.

That one-line summary hides a few distinctions that matter before you spend anything. Asana ships a basic, built-in time tracking feature on its higher plans, and it also sells a separate, more capable add-on. They are not the same product, and mixing them up is the fastest way to over-pay or under-scope a rollout. This guide separates the two, walks through setup, explains how budgets are calculated, and is candid about where a dedicated time-tracking tool will serve you better.

What the add-on actually does

The Timesheets and Budgets add-on turns Asana from a task tracker into a light resource-and-cost tool. According to Asana’s setup documentation, a purchased license adds five things:

• Timesheets — people log hours across tasks and projects for a given period, then submit them for review. Reviewers approve or reject.
• Project budgets — plan and monitor a budget so you can see project health as work is logged against it.
• User rates — set an hourly rate per person, per project, which feeds cost calculations automatically.
• Time and cost reporting — report on the underlying time entries by hours or by cost, including estimate-versus-actual comparisons.
• Time-tracking enhancements — extra fields such as billable/non-billable status, a description, and attribution to a single project.

The headline capability is approvals. Native Asana time tracking has no concept of submitting a timesheet for sign-off; the add-on adds that whole workflow, plus the rate and budget math that agencies and services teams actually bill against.

What it costs and which plans can buy it

The add-on is priced per user, per month, billed annually, and it sits on top of whatever plan you already pay for. You are effectively paying twice: once for the underlying Asana seat, once for the add-on license. Only assign it to the people who genuinely need to log or review time, because the per-seat cost compounds quickly across a large team.

Here is how the add-on lines up against the base plans. Verify current figures on Asana’s pricing page before budgeting, since Asana changes these periodically.

Two things worth flagging. First, native estimated-versus-actual time tracking only appears on Advanced and above, so a Starter customer’s route to real time data runs through the add-on. Second, Asana offers a 14-day self-serve trial that an admin or billing owner can start from the admin console; during the trial, everyone in your domain gets access automatically, so you do not have to hand-assign licenses just to evaluate it. For a permanent purchase, you contact your Asana sales representative. If you are still choosing a base tier, the trade-offs are laid out in our breakdown of Asana’s plan pricing for 2026.

Native time tracking versus the paid add-on

This is the distinction most write-ups blur. Asana’s built-in time tracking, documented in its time tracking help article, is included on Advanced, Enterprise, and Enterprise+ at no extra charge. You enable it per project from the customize menu, and it adds two custom fields: Estimated time and Actual time. You can run a built-in timer or enter minutes manually, and time logged on subtasks rolls up to the parent task.

That is genuinely useful for answering “did this take as long as we thought?” But it stops there. There are no rates, no budgets, no billable flag, no submission-and-approval cycle, and no cost reporting. The moment you need to bill a client, forecast spend, or have a manager sign off on hours, native tracking runs out of road. That gap is exactly what the add-on fills, and it is why the add-on carries its own price rather than being folded into Advanced.

How to set up Asana Timesheets and Budgets

Setup happens in two layers: the underlying time-tracking fields, then the add-on licensing and admin configuration. Both require admin access.

Enable the underlying time tracking fields

1. Open a project and click the Customize menu.
2. Select Time your work (labeled “time tracking” on some layouts).
3. Confirm the Estimated time and Actual time fields appear on tasks.
4. Log time with the built-in timer or by entering it manually; check that subtask time rolls up to the parent as expected.

Assign add-on licenses

1. Click your profile icon and open the Admin console.
2. Go to the Members tab.
3. In the add-on column dropdown next to a person’s name, select Timesheets and Budgets. This grants the license and makes that user a time submitter automatically.
4. To designate a reviewer, click the three-dot icon by the user’s name, choose Profile, scroll to Timesheet management, click the Reviewer icon, and select the manager who will approve their hours.

For a large rollout, skip the one-by-one clicks. Export the members CSV from the Members tab, add the term Timesheets and Budgets in the add-ons column for each person, enter a single reviewer’s email in the Reviewer column, then re-import the file. Note that only admins and super admins can assign reviewers.

Configure the domain settings

1. In the Admin console, scroll to Timesheets and Resourcing.
2. Turn on Enable billable time if you bill clients, and set a Billable default for new entries.
3. Set the Project budget currency for your domain.
4. Choose a Timesheets approval process: a simple Draft/Submit flow, or a full Draft/Submit/Approve/Reject flow.
5. Optionally create Time categories, allow general work on a project without a specific task, cap future time logging, and set weekly submission reminders.

One governance detail catches teams off guard: admins cannot see everyone’s timesheets by default. A super admin can only view a specific person’s timesheet if they hold an add-on license and are named as that user’s reviewer. Plan your reviewer assignments accordingly.

How budget tracking works

Budgets are where the add-on earns its keep. You set an hourly user rate per person on a project, define the project’s budget, and as people log time, Asana multiplies logged hours by their rates to produce actual cost. You can then track the budget in hours or in currency and compare planned spend against actuals in reporting.

The submission lifecycle is deliberately strict, which is the point for anything that touches invoicing. In Draft, both the submitter and their reviewer can edit entries. Once Submitted, the submitter drops to view-only while the reviewer can still correct entries. Once Approved, the record locks for both parties unless someone with rights recalls it. A submitter can recall a submission back to draft to fix a mistake, but not after it has been approved; reviewers can recall an approval to make post-approval corrections. Every status change is written to a Timesheet Status Activity log.

If your goal is simply to visualize effort rather than bill it, you may not need budgets at all. A dashboard chart comparing estimated to actual time, covered in our guide to Asana reporting dashboards, gets you most of that insight using only the native fields.

When not to use it

The add-on is a reasonable fit when your time and cost data already lives next to your tasks and you want approvals without leaving Asana. It is a poor fit in several common situations, and it is worth being honest about them.

• You need payroll-grade or compliance-grade timesheets. Asana tracks project time and cost; it is not a workforce-management or payroll system with overtime rules, PTO accrual, or labor-law compliance. A dedicated tool such as a specialist time-and-attendance platform will handle those cases properly.
• You want granular, per-second billing across many clients with complex invoicing. Purpose-built time-tracking apps offer richer rate cards, retainer handling, and invoice generation that the add-on does not attempt.
• Most of your team lives outside Asana. If contractors or field staff never open Asana, forcing them into it to log time is friction. A standalone tracker with a lightweight mobile or browser-extension timer usually wins.
• You only need to see effort, not cost. If you are on Advanced or above, the built-in estimated-versus-actual fields are free. Paying $5.99 per seat to answer “how long did this take?” is over-buying.
• Your resourcing question is about capacity, not cost. Balancing who is over-committed is a workload problem, better addressed through capacity and workload planning than through timesheets.

The tell is simple. If your reason for tracking time is billing, cost forecasting, or sign-off, the add-on belongs in the conversation. If your reason is anything else, start with the free native fields and only upgrade when a real invoicing or approval need appears.

Frequently asked questions

Is Asana Timesheets and Budgets included in any plan?

No. It is a separate paid add-on at $5.99 per user per month, billed annually, and it sits on top of a Starter, Advanced, Enterprise, or Enterprise+ subscription. The free Personal plan cannot buy it. You pay for both the base seat and the add-on license for each person who needs it.

What is the difference between built-in time tracking and the add-on?

Built-in time tracking, free on Advanced and above, adds estimated and actual time fields plus a timer. The add-on layers on submitted-and-approved timesheets, hourly user rates, project budgets, billable flags, and cost reporting. If you need approvals or billing, the native fields alone will not cover it.

Which plans can purchase the add-on?

The Timesheets and Budgets add-on is available on Starter, Advanced, Enterprise, and Enterprise+ plan tiers. It is not offered on the free Personal plan. Existing paying customers can also start a 14-day self-serve trial from the admin console before committing to a purchase.

Can managers approve or reject submitted hours?

Yes, if you enable the full approval process. A time reviewer, usually a manager, examines each submitted timesheet and approves or rejects it. Once submitted, the person who logged the time is locked to view-only until the reviewer acts, and approved timesheets lock entirely unless recalled.

Can admins see everyone’s timesheets?

Not automatically. A domain admin or super admin can only view a specific user’s timesheet if they hold a Timesheets and Budgets license and are designated as that user’s time reviewer. Admins do retain override rights to edit or delete individual time entries when corrections are needed.

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