Add a row per work segment, set the start and end time, and the calculator sums minutes across the whole week, deducting any unpaid break and bucketing totals by date. Math is plain arithmetic — no time-clock service, no employer login — so it works the same whether you bill hourly to one client or are reconciling a paper time-clock at month end. For payroll periods longer than a week, copy the daily totals into a spreadsheet; the calculator is intentionally per-period rather than persistent. For business-day counts (e.g. for a salaried month) see business days between; for adding hours rather than recording them, the add business days tool handles the working-day case.
Common use cases
- Freelance invoice prep. You worked variable hours across the week and need a single billable number for an invoice. Enter each session as a row, deduct lunch as `breakMin`, and read the total off the summary card. Paste the per-day totals into the invoice line items if your client wants the breakdown.
- Reconciling a paper time-clock. Your employer still uses a punch-card and you want to sanity-check the payroll calculation. Re-enter each shift here; if the calculator total disagrees with the payroll number by more than the rounding rule (most US employers round to the nearest quarter-hour), file a correction.
- Tracking overtime threshold. Most jurisdictions pay overtime above 40 hours per week (US FLSA) or 48 hours (UK Working Time Regulations). Plug in your week and watch the total — if it crosses your threshold mid-week, you can negotiate which day to cut short. The calculator does not know your jurisdiction; it just gives you the number.
- Comparing a four-day vs five-day schedule. Considering a compressed schedule (4 × 10-hour days)? Enter both layouts as separate scenarios and confirm the weekly total stays at 40 hours. If your jurisdiction calculates daily overtime (California: >8 h/day), the compressed schedule may still hit overtime even at the same weekly total.
How it works
Each row contributes (end − start − break) minutes. End-times earlier than start-times are interpreted as crossing midnight (the calculator adds 1440 minutes to the span), so a 22:00–06:00 shift records eight hours under whichever date you assigned to the row. Multiple rows on the same date are summed into the per-day bucket. The grand total is the sum across all rows. No timezone conversion happens because all inputs are wall-clock HH:MM strings — the calculator assumes you and the employer agree on the clock you are reading.
Worked examples
Standard 5-day week
Five rows, 09:00–17:30 with a 30-minute break each day.
Result: Total 40h 00m, 8h 00m per day.
A classic 9-to-5 with a half-hour lunch is exactly 40 hours per week — the threshold above which most US employers must pay overtime under FLSA. Add up to a few rows of overtime at the bottom to see how quickly the total grows.
Overnight bartender shift
One row, 22:00–06:00 (no break).
Result: Total 8h 00m.
The calculator detects end < start and adds 24 hours to the span. Assign whichever date your timesheet uses — most hospitality employers credit the start date even when most of the work happens on the next calendar day.
Split shift with long lunch
Two rows on 2026-04-27: 09:00–12:00 and 13:00–17:30.
Result: Day total 7h 30m.
Split shifts are common in food service and retail. Modeling each segment as its own row is more accurate than one row with an inflated break — especially when lunch is unpaid and exceeds the legal minimum.
Edge cases & gotchas
- No timezone or DST handling. The calculator works in wall-clock HH:MM strings; it does not know about timezones or daylight saving. On a spring-forward day, a 21:00–05:00 shift in a DST-observing zone is actually 7 hours long, not 8 — but the calculator returns 8 because the wall clock skipped from 02:00 to 03:00. Track DST-affected shifts manually or use a payroll system that knows your zone.
- Breaks are subtracted, not validated. The calculator does not enforce a minimum break (e.g. EU Working Time Directive: 20 min after 6 hours). It just subtracts whatever you enter. If you enter a break longer than the shift, the calculator clamps the result to 0 minutes for that row rather than going negative — but the row still counts toward `byDay`.
- No overtime multiplier. The total is straight time. The calculator does not apply a 1.5× multiplier above 40 hours, nor does it know about double-time, holiday pay, or shift differentials. To get a paycheck estimate, multiply the total minutes by your hourly rate divided by 60, then layer overtime on top using your jurisdiction's rule.
- Date is a label, not a calculation input. The `date` column is purely how the calculator buckets per-day totals. You can enter "2026-04-27" for every row to lump everything into one bucket; the math is unaffected. The calendar input is a UX nicety to prevent typos like "2026-04-37".
Frequently asked questions about Weekly Timesheet Calculator
Does the calculator handle overtime calculations?
No. It returns straight worked time. To compute overtime, take the weekly total, subtract your jurisdiction's threshold (40h US FLSA, 48h UK WTR), and apply the appropriate multiplier. California, Alaska, Nevada, and a few other states also calculate daily overtime above 8 h/day.
Can I enter time in 12-hour format with AM/PM?
No — the form uses the browser's native `<input type="time">`, which most browsers render as 24-hour by default but as 12-hour with AM/PM in locales that prefer it (US, Canada, Australia, NZ). Either way, the underlying value sent to the calculator is 24-hour HH:MM.
How does the calculator handle shifts that cross midnight?
When end < start the calculator adds 24 hours, so 22:00–06:00 records as 8 hours. Assign the row to whichever calendar date your employer credits — this is usually the start date for hospitality, the end date for some healthcare systems. Both are legitimate conventions.
Why is my total off by a few minutes from my employer's?
Most US employers round time-clock punches to the nearest quarter-hour or 6-minute increment, per FLSA-permitted rounding rules. The calculator does NOT round; it sums to the minute. A 7-hour 53-minute shift here is 8 hours on a quarter-hour-rounded paystub, which is legal as long as the rounding does not systematically favor the employer.
Does the calculator save my entries?
No. Everything lives in the browser tab and disappears on refresh. This is intentional — timesheets contain personal/employment data and we have no business storing them. For a persistent log, paste the daily totals into a spreadsheet or use a dedicated time-tracking service.
Can I export the totals?
Not directly from this tool — it is read-only display. The simplest export is "select-all-and-copy" from the table. For a more structured export consider a real time-tracker (Toggl, Clockify, Harvest); they all offer CSV/PDF reports designed for invoicing.
Glossary
- Worked minutes
- For one row: max(0, span − break) where span = end − start (with end < start treated as crossing midnight). The total worked minutes is the sum across all rows; per-day totals bucket by the row's date.
- Unpaid break
- Time during a shift that is not paid and not counted toward worked minutes. Required by some jurisdictions after a threshold (UK: 20 min after 6 hours; California: 30 min after 5 hours). The calculator just subtracts whatever you enter; it does not enforce a minimum.
- Split shift
- A workday divided into two or more separated segments (e.g. 09:00–12:00 then 14:00–18:00). Common in restaurants and retail. Some jurisdictions pay a "split-shift premium" — the calculator does not include this; just enter each segment as a row.
- Overnight shift
- A shift that crosses midnight, e.g. 22:00–06:00. The calculator detects end-time < start-time and adds 24 hours to the span. Most employers credit the row to the start date; healthcare sometimes uses end date.
- FLSA
- US Fair Labor Standards Act. Requires non-exempt workers to be paid 1.5× the regular rate for hours over 40 per workweek. Some states add daily overtime rules (California: 1.5× over 8 h/day, 2× over 12 h/day).
- WTR
- UK Working Time Regulations 1998. Limits the average workweek to 48 hours over a 17-week reference period (workers can opt out). Requires a 20-minute rest break after 6 hours, 11 consecutive hours off per day, and one full day off per week.