I was working the hardest I had ever worked in my life. As a startup founder, I was putting in long hours, sacrificing sleep, and giving everything I had to make my company a success. But I quickly discovered that working hard wasn't enough. I needed to work smart, too.

That's why I was excited to discover RescueTime, a time tracking app that promised to help me stay on task and improve my work habits.

But as I used RescueTime, I quickly discovered that it had some limitations. For one, it didn't provide real-time feedback, so I had to wait until the end of the day to see how I had performed. This made it difficult to adjust my behavior in the moment and stay on track.

RescueTime also didn't have the ability to track deep work and what was blocking me from achieving it. As a startup founder, I need to spend extended periods of time working on a single project, and RescueTime didn't provide the detailed analysis and feedback that I needed to improve my deep work habits.

All of this is why I decided to build Magicflow, a productivity coaching app that addresses these limitations and provides real-time feedback and deep work tracking.

But RescueTime isn't the only time-tracking app out there. Surely one of the other alternatives should have helped? I'm only writing this article because no, none of the RescueTime alternatives could tell me how I could be more focused.

Here are some other popular alternatives, along with a brief comparison to Magicflow:

Toggl

Toggl is a time-tracking app that allows you to track the time you spend on different tasks and projects. It offers a clean, user-friendly interface and integrates with a variety of other tools and platforms. But it totally didn't work for me: it doesn't automatically track your time, and it doesn't provide real-time feedback or deep work tracking, like Magicflow does. You can learn more and try Toggl at https://www.toggl.com/.

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Time Doctor

Time Doctor is a time-tracking and productivity app that offers a range of features, including automatic time tracking, reminders, and activity tracking. However, it doesn't provide the same level of detailed feedback and analysis as Magicflow, and it doesn't offer deep work tracking. You can learn more and try Time Doctor at https://www.timedoctor.com/.

Harvest

Harvest is a time-tracking and invoicing app that offers a range of features for managing your time and billing clients. It has a clean, intuitive interface and integrates with a variety of other tools. However, it's focused on helping you bill clients, not actually be more productive, and so it doesn't offer the same level of real-time feedback and deep work tracking as Magicflow. You can learn more and try Harvest at https://www.getharvest.com/.

Rize

Rize is an automatic time-tracking app that offers a range of features, like session tracking, calendar integrations and some level of feedback. However, it doesn't offer the same level of real-time feedback and deep work tracking as Magicflow. You can learn more and try Rize at https://www.rize.io/.

ActivityWatch

ActivityWatch is an open-source time-tracking app that allows you to track your computer activity and analyze your work habits. It offers a range of features, including automatic time tracking. I thought it was so cool that they open sourced it, but the User Interface is really lacking, and it has no feedback, session analysis, or even a productivity score, nor does it give you deep work tracking like Magicflow. You can learn more and try ActivityWatch at https://activitywatch.net/.

I tried every single one of these alternatives because I really hoped one of them would help. But none of them helped me actually improve how productively I worked.

That's why I had to build Magicflow, a productivity coaching app that offers real-time feedback, automatic AI categorisation, and deep work tracking.

With Magicflow, I was able to see exactly how I was spending my time and identify areas for improvement. The real-time feedback allowed me to adjust my behavior in the moment and stay focused, and the deep work tracking helped me understand how to improve my focus and concentration.

It has been a game-changer for me, and I hope it will be for you too. I discovered how much I context switched, and how often I would have session lengths that were too short for me to even get into flow at all. I believe it can be for you, too.

If you're serious about improving your productivity and achieving your goals, I encourage you to try Magicflow for yourself and experience the benefits firsthand. You can learn more and get started at https://www.magicflow.com/.