vlastERP vs Toggl: Which Is Better for IT Consultants?

If you’re an IT freelancer or run a small consultancy, you’ve probably used — or at least considered — Toggl Track. It’s one of the most popular time trackers in the world, and for good reason. But is it enough to run your consulting business? Let’s break it down.

What Toggl Does Well

Let’s give credit where it’s due. Toggl Track is an excellent time tracker:

• Focused design— Toggl does one thing and does it well. The interface is clean, fast, and intuitive.
• Cross-platform— Desktop apps, mobile apps, browser extensions, and a web app. You can track time from anywhere.
• Privacy-first— Toggl is headquartered in Estonia and takes data privacy seriously. They’re ISO 27001 certified.
• Solid reporting— Time reports can be grouped, filtered, and exported. The visual summaries are genuinely useful.

What Toggl Doesn’t Do

Here’s where it gets tricky. Toggl is a time tracker — not a business management tool. It does not include:

• Invoicing— You cannot generate an invoice from your tracked time. You need a separate tool (FreshBooks, Xero, etc.).
• Expense tracking— No way to log business expenses or attribute them to projects.
• Project management— Toggl has “Projects” for organizing time entries, but no task boards, milestones, or status tracking.
• Profitability analysis— You can see how many hours you spent, but not whether a project was actually profitable after accounting for expenses, taxes, and non-billable time.

For a solo freelancer who just needs to track hours and nothing else, Toggl is great. But the moment you need to invoice a client, manage a project, or understand your margins, you need additional tools.

Where vlastERP Fills the Gap

vlastERP was built specifically for the workflow that IT consultants and freelancers actually follow: track time → manage projects → invoice clients → analyze profitability. Everything is connected:

• Time entries flow directly into invoices— Select unbilled hours, click “Generate Invoice,” and line items are created automatically with the correct rates and totals.
• Profitability is calculated in real time— Revenue minus costs (including time cost, expenses, and overhead) per client, per project.
• 6 RBAC roles— When you bring on a subcontractor, you can give them access to track time without seeing your financial data.
• EU compliance built in— GDPR, GoBD, and reverse-charge VAT handling. If you invoice across EU borders, this matters.

Feature Comparison

Pricing Comparison

At first glance, Toggl Premium at $18/user/month and vlastERP Professional at €9/month look like they’re in a similar range. But there’s a critical difference: Toggl charges per user, while vlastERP’s plans include multiple seats.

• Toggl Premium for 5 users: $18 × 5 = $90/month
• vlastERP Team for 5 users: €29/month (flat)

The Real Cost

But pricing for time tracking alone misses the bigger picture. If you’re using Toggl, you almost certainly need additional tools for invoicing and project management. Here’s what a typical stack looks like:

• Toggl Premium: $18/month
• FreshBooks Plus: $17/month
• Monday.com Basic: $12/month
• Total: $47/month (for a single user)

With vlastERP, you get all three capabilities — time tracking, invoicing, and project management — for €9/month. That’s an 80% cost reduction while eliminating the friction of copying data between disconnected tools.

Verdict

Choose Togglif you only need time tracking. If your workflow starts and ends at the timer — maybe you bill through a staffing agency, or your company handles invoicing separately — Toggl is a focused, well-built tool that does its job well.

Choose vlastERPif you need the full business stack. If you track time, send invoices, manage projects, and want to know which clients are actually profitable — vlastERP replaces the entire toolchain at a fraction of the cost.

For a deeper feature-by-feature breakdown, see our full vlastERP vs Toggl comparison page. Ready to switch? Check our Toggl migration guide.

If you’re also considering other alternatives, read how we replaced 5 tools with one ERP or see why Harvest users are switching.