Logging time in Productive normally means picking a budget or deal and a service before you can save anything.
A draft time entry removes that requirement entirely. It works a bit like an email draft without a recipient, subject line, or body: you can save one with nothing filled in, not even a service or a duration.
đ For the practical steps, see Creating and Submitting Draft Time Entries and Managing and Deleting Draft Time Entries.
Draft time entries are available on the Essential, Professional, and Ultimate subscription plans.
What Is a Draft Time Entry
Nothing is required to start a draft, not even time.
You can save a draft with 0 duration, no service, no note, and no task linked.
The date and the person are filled in automatically by the interface.
Everything, including the duration itself, can be added or adjusted later.
đ A draft is not a separate object from a time entry. It's an early, incomplete state of the same record.
Why Draft Time Entries Exist
Requiring certain fields before you can save anything creates friction when you just want to log that you worked, without stopping to fill in details.
Which fields those are depends entirely on the budget or deal: some have no required fields beyond a service, others require a note and/or task as well, via Required Time Entry Fields. That friction tends to lead to time being logged inaccurately, late, or not at all.
Draft time entries give you a middle ground. You can capture the time frame immediately, then fill in whatever that specific budget or deal requires, whenever you have a moment. The entry stays a draft for as long as any field that budget or deal has marked mandatory is still missing.
đ If a budget or deal has no required fields beyond a service, there's no draft stage to speak of once you pick that service: the button shows Save, not Save as draft, and saving creates a confirmed entry right away. Drafts only stay drafts when something mandatory for that budget or deal is still unfilled.
The Draft Time Entry Lifecycle
A draft goes through roughly this journey:
Draft: created the incomplete entry, visible only to you.
Confirmed: the entry is complete and no longer a draft.
Submitted (if your organization uses timesheet submission): you've formally submitted the entry as part of a timesheet, before it goes to approval.
Awaiting Approval: waiting on your approver, if approvals are enabled.
Approved: reviewed and accepted.
Rejected: reviewed and declined, and can be fixed and sent back through.
Unapproved: a previously approved entry that's been reverted, back for another look.
đ See Approving Time: Overview for how review and approval work once an entry leaves the draft stage.
Visibility and Reporting
A draft is visible only to the person who created it.
It doesn't appear to your project manager or the time entry approver.
It does not appear in the project, budget, or deal Time tabs.
It isn't included in reports, summaries, or budget usage.
It has no effect on billing or profitability figures.
Once a draft is complete and saved, it becomes a regular time entry and follows the normal visibility and reporting rules.
Where You'll See Drafts in Productive
Drafts are visually marked wherever time entries appear:
My Time, across the Day, Timesheet, and Calendar views.
Timer
The Time tab on a task.
Time tracking widgets (desktop app).
If you have any drafts or rejected entries, a For review badge appears next to the date navigation in My Time and the timer, showing a count.
Clicking it opens the Review Time panel, with separate Rejected and Drafts tabs, each showing its own count, so unfinished or declined work doesn't get lost.
đ For what happens when an entry lands in the Rejected tab, and how to fix and resubmit it, see Creating and Submitting Draft Time Entries.
