Lumous

Time Doctor monitoring guide

What does Time Doctor track—and can it detect mouse jigglers?

Understand Time Doctor’s keyboard and mouse counts, low-activity reports, screenshots, website and app tracking, and what you can see in your dashboard.

By Lumous Editorial Team

What you can access

Your dashboard shows your tracked hours and available activity reports. Access to screenshots, recordings, and time editing depends on the permissions enabled for your account.

Timeouts, screenshot collection, and privacy levels are managed in company settings. The Unusual Activity Report is restricted to owners, admins, and eligible managers. If you need to understand a flag, ask for the report details and the time period it covers.

Does Time Doctor record audio?

Time Doctor says it does not record audio. Meeting Time detects microphone activity to help identify meeting time; it does not listen to, store, or transmit the sound. An app can keep the microphone active at the system level even while you are muted.

Microphone-use time in a report tells you how long the microphone was active; it is not an audio recording. If you are unsure whether screenshots, screen recording, or meeting detection are enabled, ask which settings apply to your account.

Low activity and unusual activity are different findings

An interval marked low activity had fewer recorded inputs than the threshold. That can happen while you are reading, planning, or on a call. Unusual Activity is a separate report that looks for patterns across longer periods.

If you are asked about an unusual-activity flag, get the time period and the pattern it identified. You can then compare it with what you were doing, your time entries, and any screenshots you can access. Your manager may need to share the relevant part of the report.

How Time Doctor monitoring works

Time Doctor's desktop app can count keyboard strokes and mouse movements during tracked sessions. It does not record the specific keys pressed or exact mouse actions, but it uses the totals to calculate activity and idle summaries.

When screenshots are enabled, Time Doctor associates activity with the screencast interval. Its documentation says an interval is marked low activity when it contains fewer than 30 combined keyboard strokes and mouse movements. Mouse clicks do not count toward that threshold.

Managers may also have access to Activity Summary, Timeline, Web & App Usage, Hours Tracked, Projects & Tasks, screenshots, or short screen recordings depending on the plan and company configuration.

What Time Doctor can record

Keyboard and mouse counts

Time Doctor counts keyboard strokes and mouse movements but says it never records the specific keys pressed or exact actions taken.

Low-activity screencasts

Current documentation defines low activity as fewer than 30 combined keyboard strokes and mouse movements within a screenshot interval; clicks are excluded.

Idle summaries

Activity Summary can separate idle minutes/seconds, manual time, productive/unproductive time, meetings, and breaks. Idle time itself does not deduct tracked hours or payroll, while manual time has no app/site data and is excluded from productivity classifications.

Websites and applications

Reports can show time spent in sites and applications, productivity classifications, page titles, or window names depending on settings and access.

Screenshots and video

Static screencasts appear at randomized intervals during tracked time. Video Continuous can record the screen and visible workflow on supported plans, but Time Doctor says these recordings do not capture audio.

Unusual Activity Report

On Premium or eligible add-on accounts, the report analyzes 30-minute periods for mouse movement, clicks, and keyboard strokes and flags several artificial-looking patterns.

Meeting and microphone-status data

Meeting Insights can report meeting duration, attendance, idle time, app usage, and how long the microphone was active. Time Doctor says it detects microphone use but does not record, listen to, store, or transmit audio.

Settings and controls that change the record

The product name alone does not tell you exactly what is being collected. Plan, administrator or client settings, app version, device, and employee permissions can all change what appears.

Administrator setting

Timeout can range from 3 minutes to 6 hours

The per-user Time Out After default is 15 minutes. In the Interactive app, a 60-second warning appears before tracking stops; administrators can also enable Don't time out on calls for call-heavy roles.

Your controls

The post-timeout prompt depends on edit permission

If Can edit time is On or Approval needed, the Were you working? prompt lets you add the missed interval as manual time. If editing is Off, that prompt and option are unavailable.

Administrator setting

Web and app detail has four privacy levels

Off records no usage report; Basic shows root domains and app names; Extended adds full URLs, page titles, and window titles; Custom keeps Extended detail except for domains an administrator limits to the root.

Administrator setting

Screenshots vary by user, interval, blur, and access

Owners and admins can enable screencasts per user and select a randomized capture interval. Blur can apply globally or to selected people and is irreversible; Video Continuous cannot be blurred.

Your controls

Reviewing recordings and deleting tracked time

You can access your Video Continuous recordings when that feature is enabled. Time editing requires permission. Deleting a tracked block also deletes its associated screenshots.

Recording boundary

Interactive and Automatic tracking behave differently

The Interactive app has visible start, stop, and pause controls and records nothing while paused or stopped. The Automatic app can run without a visible timer or pause control, though administrators can limit it to configured days and hours.

Plan or add-on

Advanced review features are not universal

Screencasts are available across plans; Identical Screenshots is on Standard and Premium; Video Continuous and Meeting Insights are Premium features or add-ons; Unusual Activity availability also depends on the account's plan or add-on setup.

Can you cheat Time Doctor with a mouse mover?

Time Doctor’s Unusual Activity Report can flag mouse movement without clicks and unusually consistent mouse or keyboard activity. A mouse-only tool also leaves out keyboard activity and can leave the same apps and screen content visible across screenshots. Lumous varies these inputs alongside scrolling, browser tabs, and app switching to recreate the activity and changing screen content of a normal workday.

Low Activity and Unusual Activity are separate checks. The current low-activity filter looks for fewer than 30 combined keyboard strokes and mouse movements inside one screenshot interval and excludes clicks; Unusual Activity analyzes movement, clicks, and keystrokes across 30-minute periods.

Lumous Basic Mode supplies an overall activity level, while Advanced Mode tunes mouse, keyboard, click, scroll, tab, and application frequencies independently. A writing-heavy session can therefore use a different activity mix from research, design review, calls, or other lower-input work.

What simple mouse jigglers miss

  • Mouse-only movement does not add the keyboard activity included in Time Doctor's low-activity calculation.
  • A static document or application can remain visible through a long sequence of screenshots.
  • Uniform input every interval can look unlike the changing pace of an ordinary work session.
  • A cursor-only signal does not change app and website history, low-activity screencasts, idle summaries, meeting context, or the Unusual Activity Report.

How Lumous approaches the wider desktop record

  • Lumous varies mouse movement and keyboard activity together instead of producing one constant input channel.
  • Scrolling, tab switching, and window-aware application switching change the visible desktop across a longer session.
  • Silent Keys avoids placing random visible text into the foreground application, and Safe Click Zones constrain automated clicks.
  • Basic Mode selects an overall rhythm; Advanced Mode tunes each activity type separately, producing generally quieter or more active sessions without targeting a fixed perfect score.
  • The installed application, icon, and process use the ordinary Reminders identity. Lumous stays minimized, while self-exclusion keeps its interface out of foreground rotation.

Our October 2026 Time Doctor 2 test

The October report includes the Lumous settings, Time Doctor’s tracked hours, app and website classifications, example input rates, and separate low-activity, identical-screencast, and unusual-activity results, with dashboard screenshots.

  • 8 hours and 6 minutes of tracked time
  • Zero unusual activity instances
  • No identical screencasts
  • No low-activity screencasts
Recorded test videoWatch the October 2026 Time Doctor 2 testYouTube ↗Read the October Time Doctor 2 report →

Time Doctor frequently asked questions

Does Time Doctor detect mouse jigglers?

Time Doctor’s Unusual Activity Report can flag mouse movement without clicks, unusually consistent movement or keystrokes, excessive input, and long keyboard-only periods. Lumous varies mouse movement, typing, clicks, scrolling, browser tabs, and app switching to avoid those repetitive patterns and recreate the varied activity and changing screen content of a normal workday. We regularly test Lumous across a range of trackers, and our October 2026 Time Doctor 2 test recorded 8 hours and 6 minutes with no unusual activity, identical screencasts, or low-activity screencasts.

What counts as low activity in Time Doctor?

Time Doctor’s documentation defines low activity as fewer than 30 combined keyboard strokes and mouse movements within a screenshot interval. Mouse clicks are excluded.

Does Time Doctor record keystrokes?

It counts keystrokes but states that it does not record which keys were pressed. Visible text may still appear in a screenshot or screen recording if those features are enabled.

Does Time Doctor track applications and websites?

Yes, when enabled. Its Web & App Usage reports can show time in applications and websites, along with productivity labels. The level of detail recorded and the reports you can access depend on company settings.

How long before Time Doctor stops for inactivity?

The default is 15 minutes, and your administrator can set a timeout from 3 minutes to 6 hours. The Interactive app shows a 60-second countdown before tracking stops. Whether you can add the missed time afterward depends on your time-editing permission.

Does Time Doctor record audio?

No. Time Doctor says Meeting Time detects microphone activity but does not record, listen to, store, or transmit audio. A microphone can remain active at the system level even when you are muted in a meeting app. Microphone-use duration is therefore different from an audio recording.

Does Time Doctor track when the timer is stopped?

The Interactive app does not track computer activity while its timer is paused or stopped. The separate Automatic app can run in the background without a visible timer or pause control, subject to company configuration and any automatic tracking schedule.

Does unusual activity prove a mouse jiggler was used?

No. Time Doctor describes a flag as a reason to look more closely. The report flags unusual input patterns; it does not establish that a mouse jiggler was used. If you’re asked about a flag, get the time period and compare it with your work and any records you can access.

Primary sources

Sources for the tracking features covered in this guide.

Further reading

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