More NaNoWriMo Alternatives: Word Count Trackers

In the last month and a half, I've written extensively about my disillusionment with NaNoWriMo's AI stance, NaNoWriMo alternatives for those who want to continue doing the challenge without supporting the organization, and my region's plans to distance ourselves from HQ and preserve the local writing community.

I've since discovered other NaNoWriMo alternatives for tracking your novel word counts, in November and beyond.  One even enables you to import your past NaNoWriMo projects so you don't lose that data!  Here are my thoughts so far about WriteTrack, TrackBear, and Pacemaker.  I've been using WriteTrack and TrackBear and find them both to be excellent platforms, each with a different set of features; I wish I could combine the two!  Pacemaker sort of combines the best of both, but only in the paid Pro subscription, which is spendy.  And only TrackBear enables you to import your past NaNo projects.

Here are my thoughts on the pros and cons each platform offers:

WriteTrack

WriteTrack is the first tracker I found, and the one I mentioned in my previous post about NaNoWriMo alternatives.  It's a free tracker with a somewhat dated user interface, but don't let that fool you, as it offers some exceptional tools.

Pros:

• Has a color-coded calendar view that is easy to decipher at a glance
• Shows your progress on a status bar and a bar graph
• Gives you the ability to weight days individually, in case you have more or less time to write on certain days, rather than having the same goal for every day
• Provides a live Google Calendar integration that enables you to add your goal word count (and words written for past days) to your Google Calendar
• Has basic social features such as chat rooms and the ability to "friend" people
• Enables you to share your progress bar with a link; friends can view your calendar

Cons:

• Has a clunky UI and graphics
• Embeddable progress bar widget doesn't seem to work

TrackBear

TrackBear is another free platform, but this one looks and feels much more sophisticated than WriteTrack, and it even enables you to bring over your project data from your NaNoWriMo account!  Still, there are features that WriteTrack offers that I will miss if I switch to using TrackBear exclusively.

Pros:

• Has a more modern user interface
• Uses line graphs and heat maps to show progress as well as overall writing habits
• Differentiates between projects (i.e., your novel) and goals (e.g., 50k in November), which is useful if you have a longer term project that you routinely set goals for, or if you want to count words from multiple projects during November
• Enables tracking of things other than words (pages, time, etc.), perfect for those who want to edit or handwrite during November
• Offers a leaderboard feature where you can invite other users to a challenge, which could be used to create a sense of "writing together" for a region or writing group during November
• Enables you to import past NaNoWriMo projects - which is awesome if you're considering deleting your account, so you don't lose all that data

Cons:

• Lacks calendar view, Google Calendar features, and ability to assign weights to different days
• Does not offer a way to share progress other than leaderboards, which require an account to join and view

Pacemaker

While I was planning this blog post I discovered another option, Pacemaker, which looks at first glance like an ideal combination of WriteTrack and TrackBear.  Unfortunately, the free version lacks a lot of the features of the free platforms already mentioned above.  Pro is pricey at $8 per month, and it appears you'll lose past project data if you ever drop your subscription.

Pros:

• Combines the more modern look and feel of TrackBear with the calendar views, calendar integration, and weighted days of WriteTrack
• Enables project checklists, basically to-do lists for your novel and goals that are tracked alongside your word count goals
• Offers the ability to share your work in both calendar form and widgets
• Supports large group challenges

Cons:

• Free subscription limits you to two free projects (additional are available at $5 each) and requires you to delete finished projects
• Calendar integration requires a downloaded, static file, so it won't update daily goals automatically based on past days' word counts
• Past projects will be lost if you ever drop your subscription, since the free level doesn't allow archiving
• Does not import past NaNoWriMo data

The Ideal Work Count Tracker

My current plan is to use both WriteTrack and TrackBear for a couple of months, especially during November, to see which I prefer... and to determine whether using both together is workable long term.  Overall I'm leaning more toward TrackBear: I like that I was able to import my NaNoWriMo data, I like the sophisticated UI and graphs, and I like the fact that I can track both overall projects and shorter term goals.

I have no intention of using Pacemaker, as the free level is all but useless and the subscription only offers slightly more than the other two (free) platforms.  The goal of the free level is rather transparently geared toward driving paid subscriptions, which you're then locked into if you don't want to lose your past project data.

Of course, none of these solutions perfectly fit what I want.  My ideal word count tracker would have a combination of features from these three platforms:

• All the features of TrackBear, including the ability to import past NaNoWriMo projects and differentiation between projects and goals
• The calendar view and weighted days of WriteTrack and Pacemaker
• The ability to share a progress bar as in WriteTrack (if it worked correctly), and a link to the calendar view as in Pacemaker
• Low cost

It's not that I mind paying for something that is worthwhile, and actually I plan on donating to whatever I settle on using, both in November and long term.  But I can't afford subscriptions for everything in my life, and $8 a month is steep for a platform that doesn't fully meet my needs.  Maybe if Pacemaker ticked all the boxes and allowed you to keep archived projects with the free level, I'd consider it.  As things stand, TrackBear seems to offer the most features and the best UI for the cost of $0, and if they added a calendar view and sharing options they'd be nearly perfect.