Idle Time

Idle time settings are one of the most important configurations for ensuring your workforce data is accurate. If idle time is not configured properly, your team's total work hours, Availability, and Productivity metrics can be significantly over- or under-reported. This guide explains what idle time is, where to adjust its settings for each agent type, and how to choose the right configuration for your organization.

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What Is Idle Time?

Idle time is an extended period of zero activity on a user's computer. Zero activity means there is no interaction through keyboard usage, mouse clicks, or mouse movement — the user is completely inactive.

Common causes of idle time include:

• Stepping away from the computer for a break
• Attending an in-person meeting or phone call without using the computer
• Forgetting to stop the timer before leaving for the day
• Sitting in a video call and listening without interacting with the computer

Idle time is not the same as low activity. If a user occasionally moves their mouse or types a few characters, that counts as activity — even minimal interaction prevents idle time from being triggered.

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Why Idle Time Settings Matter

Without proper idle time configuration, your data can become unreliable in two ways:

• Over-reported hours — If idle time is always saved, a user who forgets to stop their timer at the end of the day (with a desktop agent) or simply does not turn off their computer (with a background agent) could show 16+ hours of work time for a single day, inflating Availability and total time metrics.
• Under-reported hours — If idle time is always discarded with a short threshold, legitimate activities like attending meetings, reading printed documents, or taking a phone call will be removed from work time, making it look like the user worked less than they did.

The goal is to find a balance where genuinely unproductive idle time is excluded while legitimate work-related inactivity is preserved.

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How Idle Time Detection Works

Idle time detection is based on a threshold — the number of minutes of continuous zero activity before the period is flagged as idle. Here is how it works:

1. The agent continuously monitors keyboard and mouse activity.
2. When all activity stops, the agent starts counting.
3. If zero activity continues and reaches the configured threshold (e.g., 20 minutes), the entire period — from the first moment of inactivity to whenever activity resumes — is flagged as idle time.
4. If activity resumes before the threshold is reached, the inactive period counts as normal work time.

Example: If the idle time threshold is set to 20 minutes and a user is away from their computer for 25 minutes, all 25 minutes are flagged as idle time. But if the same user was away for only 15 minutes, those 15 minutes would count as normal work time because the threshold was not reached.

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Where to Adjust Idle Time Settings

Idle time settings are configured separately for desktop agents and background agents, and the location differs for each.

For Desktop Agents

1. Click on your name at the bottom-left corner of the screen to open the menu.
2. Go to User Management.
3. Click the Desktop Agent Settings button (monitor icon) in the page header.
4. In the settings drawer, navigate to the Idle Time section.

For Background Agents

1. Click on your name at the bottom-left corner of the screen to open the menu.
2. Go to Background Agents.
3. Click the Background Agent Settings button (server/cog icon) in the top-right corner of the page header.
4. The idle time settings are visible immediately in the settings drawer.

Note: Only Owners and Admins can access and modify idle time settings for both agent types.

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Setting 1: What Should Count as Idle Time

The first setting controls how long a period of zero activity must last before it is flagged as idle time. There are two separate thresholds — one for non-communication tools and one for communication tools.

Why Two Separate Thresholds?

Communication tools like Slack, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, and email clients often involve legitimate periods of inactivity. For example, when a user is sitting in a Zoom meeting and simply listening or watching a presentation, they may not interact with their computer at all. In this case, the time is genuinely work-related even though there is zero keyboard and mouse activity.

By setting a longer threshold for communication tools, you can prevent meeting time from being incorrectly flagged as idle while still catching genuine inactivity in other applications.

Available Threshold Options

Option	Effect
10 minutes	Aggressive — flags idle time quickly. Best for roles with constant computer interaction.
20 minutes (default)	Balanced — the default for both communication and non-communication tools. Works well for most teams.
30 minutes	Lenient — allows for longer periods of reading, thinking, or short breaks without triggering idle.
60 minutes	Very lenient — only extended absences are flagged. Useful for communication tools if your team has long meetings.
Disable	No idle detection — all time counts as work time regardless of activity. Use with caution.

Recommended Configuration

Tool Type	Recommended Threshold	Reasoning
Non-communication tools	10–20 minutes	Users working in editors, browsers, and spreadsheets are typically active. Short inactivity often means they stepped away.
Communication tools	20–30 minutes	Allows for typical meeting durations where users listen without interacting with the computer.

Tip: If your team regularly has meetings longer than 30 minutes, consider setting the communication tools threshold to 60 minutes to avoid flagging meeting time as idle.

What Happens When You Disable the Threshold

If you disable the idle time threshold for a tool category, no period of inactivity in that category will ever be flagged as idle. All time will count as normal work time regardless of how long the user is inactive. This effectively means that if someone opens a communication tool and walks away for hours, all of that time counts as work.

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Setting 2: Save or Discard Idle Time

Once a period is flagged as idle, the next setting determines what happens to it. The available options differ between desktop agents and background agents.

Options for Desktop Agents

Option	What Happens	Best For
Always save	Idle time counts toward total work hours for the day. It is highlighted as idle in reports and availability views so you can still identify it.	Teams where idle periods often represent legitimate work (e.g., reading, thinking, offline tasks).
Always discard	Idle time is removed from time reports entirely. It does not count toward total work hours.	Strict time tracking environments where only active computer use should count.
Let user decide (recommended)	When the user returns to their computer after an idle period, a pop-up appears asking whether to save or discard the time. Users can also add a note explaining what they were doing (e.g., "In a meeting" or "On a phone call").	Most teams — balances accuracy with employee autonomy and trust.

Options for Background Agents

Option	What Happens
Always save	Idle time counts toward total work hours and is highlighted as idle in reports.
Always discard	Idle time is removed from time reports entirely.

Note: The "Let user decide" option is only available for desktop agents because background agents have no visible user interface. Since users do not interact with background agents, there is no way to show them a pop-up when they return to their computer.

Impact on Total Work Hours

To illustrate how this setting affects reported data:

• A user works for 8 hours total, with 1 hour of idle time during the day.
• If idle time is saved: Total reported time = 8 hours (the idle hour is included but highlighted).
• If idle time is discarded: Total reported time = 7 hours (the idle hour is removed).

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Setting 3: Automatically Discard Very Long Idle Time

The third setting acts as a safety net. It automatically discards idle time that exceeds a specified duration, even when idle time is otherwise set to "Always save" or "Let user decide."

This setting is designed to handle edge cases like:

• A user with a desktop agent forgetting to stop their timer before leaving for the day
• A user with a background agent not turning off their computer when they finish work, leaving it running overnight or over a weekend
• Any situation where hours of idle time clearly do not represent work

Available Options

Option	Effect
Never	No automatic discard — all idle time is handled by the save/discard setting above.
2 hours	The most aggressive. Good if you know that any absence longer than 2 hours is almost certainly not work.
3 hours	Catches most non-work idle periods while allowing for extended meetings.
4 hours (recommended starting point)	A safe default that removes overnight/forgotten-timer scenarios while preserving most legitimate idle periods.
5–12 hours	Progressively more lenient. Higher values only catch the most extreme cases (e.g., computer left on all night).

How It Works

When the auto-discard threshold is reached, the idle time is treated as if "Always discard" was selected — the time is removed from reports entirely, regardless of the save/discard setting above.

Example: Idle time is set to "Always save" with an auto-discard threshold of 4 hours. A user forgets to stop their timer and leaves for the evening. After 4 hours of continuous idle time, that entire idle period is automatically discarded. But a 2-hour idle period earlier in the day (from a long meeting) would still be saved as configured.

Note: For background agents, the auto-discard setting is only visible when "Always save" is selected as the idle time handling method. If "Always discard" is selected, all idle time is already being discarded, so the auto-discard threshold is unnecessary.

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Recommended Configurations

For Most Teams (Balanced Approach)

Setting	Desktop Agents	Background Agents
Non-communication threshold	20 minutes	20 minutes
Communication threshold	30 minutes	30 minutes
Save or discard	Let user decide	Always save
Auto-discard long idle	4 hours	4 hours

For Strict Time Tracking

Setting	Desktop Agents	Background Agents
Non-communication threshold	10 minutes	10 minutes
Communication threshold	20 minutes	20 minutes
Save or discard	Always discard	Always discard
Auto-discard long idle	N/A (already discarding)	N/A (already discarding)

For High-Trust / Meeting-Heavy Teams

Setting	Desktop Agents	Background Agents
Non-communication threshold	20 minutes	20 minutes
Communication threshold	60 minutes	60 minutes
Save or discard	Let user decide	Always save
Auto-discard long idle	4 hours	4 hours

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Best Practices

• Start with defaults and adjust gradually. The default 20-minute threshold works well for most organizations. Monitor your data for a few weeks before making changes.
• Use "Let user decide" for desktop agents. This gives users ownership over their time data and provides context through notes, which makes the data more trustworthy for managers reviewing it.
• Set the auto-discard threshold to 4 hours as a baseline. This catches forgotten timers and overnight scenarios without interfering with legitimate long meetings or breaks.
• Set a longer threshold for communication tools. Meeting time is real work time. A 30-minute or 60-minute threshold for communication tools prevents meetings from being incorrectly flagged as idle.
• Review your approach periodically. As your team's work patterns change — more remote meetings, different break habits, new tools — revisit idle time settings to make sure they still match reality.
• Combine with offline meeting tracking for desktop agents. If you enable "Allow offline meetings tracking" in Desktop Agent Settings, users can mark idle periods as offline meetings, providing even more context for time that would otherwise appear as idle.