Automatically detecting when a user has stopped working and prompting them to adjust their timer.
Idle detection is a feature in time tracking software that monitors user activity and detects when the tracked user has stopped working. After a configurable period of inactivity, the software prompts the user to decide what to do with the elapsed time.
A typical idle detection prompt gives three options: keep all time (the user was thinking or in a meeting), discard the idle period and continue (the user stepped away and wants to remove that time), or stop the timer entirely (the work session ended while the user was away).
Idle detection solves one of the most common time tracking problems: forgetting to stop the timer. Without it, a two-hour lunch break attached to a running timer inflates the client invoice. With it, the software catches the gap and lets you correct it before it becomes a billing error.
Most implementations detect idle by monitoring keyboard and mouse activity. Some also integrate with system activity, screen lock events, or calendar data to make smarter decisions about what counts as active work.
In ClockMe
ClockMe runs idle detection in two layers. The browser-tab layer prompts you with three options (keep all time, discard idle, or stop) when it detects inactivity in the dashboard tab — configurable threshold from 2 to 30 minutes. The server-side AI session auto-stop layer auto-stops any MCP-started or hook-started timer after a configurable inactivity threshold (default 30 minutes, range 5–480), with the stop time pinned to your last activity so AFK time is not billed. The two layers are independent — the server watchdog protects you even when the dashboard tab is closed.
Try ClockMe free →Two signals. In the browser, ClockMe monitors keyboard, mouse, and scroll events inside the dashboard tab. For MCP-started timers, the server tracks every MCP call and every UserPromptSubmit-hook heartbeat as activity — silence past the threshold triggers the watchdog auto-stop.
Yes. The browser-tab prompt can be toggled off in Settings → Idle Detection. The server-side AI session auto-stop can be disabled by setting the threshold to 0 in Settings → AI session auto-stop, though we recommend keeping it on as a safety net.
5–15 minutes is typical for the browser-tab prompt during deep dev work. For the server-side AI session auto-stop, 30 minutes is the default and works well for most Claude Code workflows — long enough to cover thinking time, short enough to catch a forgotten timer same-day.