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Harvest Alternative After the 2026 Price Increase: TimeQuorum vs Harvest

Harvest is the tool a lot of agencies grew up on — time tracking with invoicing baked in. But in 2026 its pricing changed shape: the flat per-seat plan became a seat fee plus usage-based charges on invoices, projects, clients, and tasks. If your renewal notice was the reason you searched "Harvest alternative," this comparison is for you.

TimeQuorum and Harvest solve the same fundamental problem: track billable time, then turn it into invoices. This comparison covers what changed in Harvest's pricing, and where the two products diverge — pricing model, free-tier generosity, roles, and structure — so you can tell which fits your team.

What changed with Harvest's pricing in 2026

Following Harvest's mid-2025 acquisition by Bending Spoons, its pricing moved from a flat per-seat rate (Pro at roughly $11/seat/month) to a two-part model:

• A per-seat plan fee — Teams from about $9/seat/month and Enterprise from about $14/seat/month, billed annually.
• Usage-based fees on top — separate charges tied to invoices sent, projects created, clients managed, and tasks logged. The advertised seat price does not include this layer, and per-unit rates aren't published on the pricing page.

Three things have drawn the most criticism from Harvest's own customers: the total bill is hard to predict before it arrives, the post-trial checkout pre-selects the higher Enterprise tier with annual billing, and the new pricing lands automatically at each customer's renewal date. Teams with lots of small invoices or high project churn — exactly the agency profile Harvest was built for — are the ones reporting the sharpest increases.

TimeQuorum vs Harvest at a glance

Competitor pricing and features are as of August 2026 and may change — check getharvest.com for current details, including how its usage-based fees are calculated for your workload.

Where Harvest wins

Harvest has a long head start, and it still shows in a few places:

• Estimates. Harvest can send an estimate and convert it to an invoice. TimeQuorum's estimates-to-invoice workflow is on the roadmap.
• Integration catalog breadth. Harvest connects directly to QuickBooks and Xero and has a large catalog of app integrations (Asana, Trello, Slack, browser extensions). TimeQuorum covers the accounting handoff with QuickBooks- and Xero-formatted exports and a full REST API with personal access tokens, but doesn't have a comparable app catalog.
• Single-seat start. If you're a true solo and want to pay for exactly one seat, Harvest's paid plan starts at one; TimeQuorum's paid minimum is two.

What's no longer on that list: payment collection. TimeQuorum invoices carry a secure Stripe pay link your clients can use to pay by card or ACH bank debit — including partial payments and automatic reminders — with no per-invoice fee from us on any plan.

Where TimeQuorum wins

1. A bill you can predict from your headcount

TimeQuorum's entire pricing model is seats × rate. Send one invoice a month or three hundred, manage five clients or five hundred, spin up as many projects and tasks as your work needs — the bill doesn't move. Under Harvest's 2026 model, each of those is a metered dimension billed on top of the seat fee. If the reason you're here is that your Harvest renewal was a surprise, this is the difference that matters. And it stays put: our 24-month price-lock guarantee means the rate you sign up at can't go up for two years.

2. Lower per-seat cost even before usage fees

At $5/user/month ($4.25 annually) for Starter and $8/user/month ($6.80 annually) for Professional, TimeQuorum lands under Harvest's Teams seat fee (about $9/seat/month billed annually) before Harvest's usage charges are added. For an invoice-heavy agency, the gap after usage fees can be much larger.

3. A free tier a small team can actually use

Harvest's free plan is one person and two projects — really an extended trial. TimeQuorum's free plan covers up to 5 users with unlimited time entries, personal reports included, so a small team or solo freelancer can run real work before paying anything. If Harvest's new pricing pushed your single-seat plan into the hundreds per year, this is your exit.

4. Granular roles out of the box

TimeQuorum ships a proper role model — admin, manager, accounting, member, observer — so you can separate who runs reports, who edits invoices, and who only sees their own entries, without upgrading for it.

5. Isolation and structure

Each TimeQuorum workspace gets its own database (not a shared multi-tenant table), and the four-level client → project → class → task hierarchy models more complex engagements than a flat client/project/task list.

Switching from Harvest

Harvest lets you export your clients, projects, tasks, and time entries as CSV from Reports → Detailed time. TimeQuorum imports those files directly: upload them on the built-in Import Data page (available to workspace admins on every plan, including Free) and you get a full preview — entity counts, person matching, archived projects — before anything is written. Commit the import and your Harvest history is queryable in TimeQuorum reports the same afternoon, with codes and archived state preserved. Changed your mind? One-click undo removes everything the import created, as long as nothing has been edited or invoiced since. Because Harvest's new pricing takes effect at your renewal date, the practical move is to run TimeQuorum's free tier in parallel before your renewal, import your history, then switch when you're confident.

Who each is best for

Choose Harvest if: you need built-in estimates or its app-integration catalog right now, and a usage-metered bill isn't a concern for your workload.

Choose TimeQuorum if: you're an individual contractor or small-to-medium team that wants time tracking, invoicing, and online payments at a flat per-seat price you can predict from headcount — with a free tier your whole team can use and roles included from the start.

Frequently asked questions

Why are Harvest customers looking for alternatives in 2026?

Harvest's 2026 pricing replaced its flat per-seat model with a seat fee plus usage-based charges on invoices sent, projects created, clients managed, and tasks logged. The advertised seat price doesn't include the usage layer, and the change applies at each customer's renewal date — so many teams opened a renewal notice that no longer matched what they'd budgeted.

Does TimeQuorum charge usage fees?

No. The bill is seats × rate, full stop. Invoices, clients, projects, and tasks are never metered, on any plan — and we don't take a per-invoice cut when your clients pay online.

Is TimeQuorum cheaper than Harvest?

Generally, yes. TimeQuorum starts at $5/user/month ($4.25 billed annually) versus Harvest's Teams seat fee of about $9/seat/month billed annually — and that's before Harvest's usage fees are added. TimeQuorum's free tier covers up to 5 users rather than one.

Does TimeQuorum do invoicing and payments like Harvest?

Yes — invoices are generated directly from filtered time entries on the Professional plan, sent by email with a PDF attached, and carry a secure Stripe pay link so clients can pay by card or ACH. Recurring schedules cover retainer-style billing, and QuickBooks- and Xero-formatted exports handle the accounting handoff.

What does Harvest have that TimeQuorum doesn't yet?

Estimates, direct API connections to QuickBooks and Xero (TimeQuorum uses formatted exports), and a larger third-party app catalog. Estimates are on TimeQuorum's roadmap; expense tracking now ships in both products.