Ever Gauzy: The Open Source ERP That Actually Includes Time Tracking

If you've ever tried to piece together an ERP system from open source parts, you know the pain. You need accounting, HR, invoicing, maybe some project management. Then you need time tracking. Then you need to make it all talk to each other. It's a juggling act that usually ends in duct tape and custom scripts.

Ever Gauzy takes a different approach. It's a full-blown ERP, CRM, and HRM platform that ships with time tracking built in, not bolted on. For developers, that means one codebase to deploy, one database to maintain, and a feature set that usually requires three or four different SaaS subscriptions.

What It Does

Ever Gauzy is a comprehensive business management platform built with TypeScript and Angular on the front end, NestJS on the back end. It covers:

• CRM for customer relationships and sales pipelines
• HRM including employee profiles, onboarding, and performance reviews
• ERP with invoicing, accounting, and expense tracking
• Time tracking with activity monitoring, screenshots, and productivity metrics
• Project management with task assignment and tracking

All of this sits on a PostgreSQL database with optional Redis for caching. It's also fully extensible, so if you need to add custom modules, you're working with clean NestJS architecture.

Why It's Cool

The time tracking is the standout feature. It's not just a simple start/stop timer. Ever Gauzy gives you:

• Screenshots taken at random intervals (think Time Doctor but self-hosted)
• Activity levels calculated from keyboard and mouse interactions
• App and URL tracking to see what employees are actually using
• Timesheet management that feeds directly into payroll and invoicing

From a technical perspective, the project is a solid example of a monorepo done right. All packages are under packages/ with shared code for both frontend and backend. The API is well documented with Swagger, and they've set up demo data providers so you can spin up a fully populated instance quickly.

It's also genuinely open source under AGPL-3.0, which might not be for everyone, but it means the core product is free and there's an active community building plugins.

How to Try It

The easiest way to check it out is through their live demo. But if you want it running locally:

# Clone the repo
git clone https://github.com/ever-co/ever-gauzy.git

# Install dependencies
cd ever-gauzy
npm install

# Set up your environment
cp .env.example .env

# Run with Docker
docker-compose up -d postgres
npm run api:dev
npm run client:dev

You'll need Node.js 18+, PostgreSQL, and optional Redis if you want to play with caching. The docs on their GitHub are solid, and they've got guides for Docker setup and Kubernetes deployment if you're going production.

Final Thoughts

Ever Gauzy is one of those rare projects that actually delivers on the "all-in-one" promise. For dev teams that need time tracking without selling their data to a SaaS company, or for consultancies that want to manage clients, staff, and billing in one place, it's worth a serious look.

The learning curve is real, especially if you're new to NestJS or Angular, but the codebase is clean enough that you'll find your way around. Whether you use it as-is or fork it for your own projects, it's a solid piece of engineering.

Have you tried Ever Gauzy? Let me know what you think.

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