Application Usage
App Usage shows you, honestly, where your screen time went: which applications you used, for how long, how many sessions, and how often you switched between them — grouped into productivity categories so the time sinks stand out.
Open App Usage in the TimeCampus navigation at app.timecampus.com. Capture preferences live under App Usage → Settings.
This is insight, not surveillance: TimeCampus records aggregate usage per application — never screenshots, never keystrokes, never window contents.
What the App Usage page shows
At the top, four summary cards:
| Card | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Total Screen Time | Combined time across all recorded applications |
| Productive Time | The share of screen time spent in apps categorised as productive |
| App Switches | How many times you switched applications — the context-switching tax, made visible |
| Focus Sessions | Stretches of sustained usage long enough to count as real focus (90+ minutes) |
Below the cards, every application is listed with:
- Time spent and number of sessions
- Its category badge
- A bar showing its share of your total screen time
Each usage record also tracks when the app was first and last used that day, so the picture is per-day and comparable across days. Summaries and top-app rankings can be scoped to a date range.
Productivity categories
Every application carries a category, and the categories drive the productive-time ratio:
| Category | Typical examples |
|---|---|
productive | Editors, design tools, docs you create in |
communication | Chat, meetings, email clients |
neutral | Utilities, file managers, reference |
distracting | The apps you already know about |
Re-categorising an app
Categories are yours to define — what's "distracting" for one role is core work for another. When you change an application's category, the change applies to all of that app's usage records, past and future, so your history stays consistent and your productive-time ratio stays honest.
Settings
App Usage → Settings controls what is captured. Capture is user-controlled — these are your switches, not an admin's:
| Setting | What it does |
|---|---|
| Track active applications | Record which application is active and for how long |
| Track browser tabs | Include browser activity in usage records |
| Distraction alerts | Get a nudge when time in distracting apps builds up (off by default) |
Turn off what you don't want captured; the analytics simply reflect less. See data controls for retention and deletion.
Where the data comes from
Usage records are fed by capture channels — the privacy-first endpoints that bring activity into TimeCampus.
The always-on native desktop and browser capture channels that record app usage continuously are part of the channels roadmap. Today, usage records arrive through connected channels and integrations rather than a shipped always-on agent.
Privacy
The privacy boundary here is deliberate and worth restating:
- No screenshots. TimeCampus never captures what is on your screen.
- No keystroke logging. It never records what you type.
- Activity signal only. A usage record is an app name, a category, and durations — what kind of work happened, not its contents.
- User-controlled. You decide in Settings what is tracked, and you can turn it off entirely.
- Aggregate for teams. Team views never expose your per-app breakdown; see the privacy model.
Using the insight
- A high App Switches count with low Focus Sessions is the classic fragmentation pattern — pair it with your focus score and consider protecting a block.
- Watch the productive ratio trend, not the daily number. Categorise honestly first; the ratio is only as truthful as your categories.
- Communication apps dominating the list? Cross-check Email Tracking and Meetings to see which conversations are actually earning their time.
Next steps
- Analytics — the cross-cutting view your app usage feeds into
- Work Patterns — how usage shapes your weekly rhythm
- Channels — connect the capture sources