How many productive hours per day do you work?

Wow I'm impressed by the people here who consistently get 8 hours of productive work done in a day. I get on average about 4 or 5 hours of real work done a day, where something actually gets built or fixed. Some days I can double that or maybe even more, but it's always split up into multiple chunks. Client work it's hard to measure because there's so many interruptions to take phone calls or urgent issues.

At 2+ hours in a row my work quality and happiness begins to degrade. Even if it's my own project that I'm really passionate about, though I might not notice it at the time. I also suspect I have some mild a.d.d. getting in the way - but who doesn't these days.

5 or 6 if coding, 7 or 8 if doing marketing or other less intense stuff. This is time doing actual work; no social media or other distractions

4-5 hours average. This is real work for any of my projects. There’s simply too much I enjoy doing next to work.
I sometimes crank in a few more hours if I really want to finish something and am excited about it, but that’s not the norm because life is not just all about work.

I have been tracking my hours for 100 weeks using pomodoro method with spreadsheet.

I usually clock 12 pomodoro (6 productive hours) per day. When I work on really interesting problem or troubleshooting, I clocked 16-20 pomodoro (about 8-10h per day).

I used to be unhappy because I clocked less than 8h per day, then I feel better when I set my expectation to 6h per day (in fact I feel surprised/accomplished when I accidentally clocked 8h per day). There is some strange psychology at play here, but it works for me.

At times I do clock 5-10 hours on weekend, so on average I clocked about 35-40h per week.

do 'day job' hours count? if so, 8 then the remaining 1 hour of productivity possibly goes towards my own project.... am i slacking?

I always try to stick to 8 or 9, sometimes a bit less if I do not feel like. I work on my own product plus mentor a tiny software consultancy team. So there is a lot of code, fair amount of planning (JIRA, Trello), some meetings.

I do work on weekends if I am free. My main limit is to not feel stretched on any day, if I do, I simply close the day.

Hi Siimon, according to research an average worker has 8 working hours out of which only 2 hours and 52 min are of productive work.
It is very important to prioritize, plan and execute work in the smart way. There are many tips to boost your productivity - one of the most important is being active and self-introspection.
To know more about it you can visit: https://bit.ly/2svnq4X.
But here the principal question is, "Will the organisations take any step in favor of employees to increase their productivity?".

I'm not accusing people on this thread of lying, but I've seen it written that when the time is closely tracked, most office workers turn out to only do 1.5 hours per day of real work.

For me, I have many days where I'm focused the entire day, but left of the time inevitably ends up being maintenance--processing email, tedious phone conversations, traveling between appointments, dealing with family or homeowner stuff, making doctor's appointments, having a phone appointment with someone just to network, refining my business knowledge by interacting on IH/HN, eating lunch, etc.

If there's 3 hours of "real" focused work in there towards building or fixing something in the direction that matters most to me, it's a good day.

I find it a little hard to believe that someone who gets 8 hours of productive work done every day has time to read and write on IH...

Usually between 3-4 coding (at my full-time job) and then I can do about another 4-6 on my side hustle (DULO).

What has your tracking shown for yourself so far?

Peak 6 hours a day but sometime 17 hours a month.

I find that I tend to be most productive in chunks of ~3 hours. I aim for 2 chunks a day with a short break in between. Anything beyond that is borrowing against future productivity.

I work 7 hours a day but I have about 3-4 hours of productive coding or writing (typically in the morning).

It depends on what I do... If it's boring stuff I hate to do, 3-5h per day. If I do designs, or coding something I really enjoy, or if it's something that needs to be fixed (and I enjoy doing the work) I can go up to 10+ hours per day... but really 8h productive work on a daily basis (consistently each and every day) it's a MYTH...

5 to 6 hours. I became pretty strict with my productive time since I moved 100 % freelance. I was part-time freelancing for many years before taking the final step forward. Since I have 2 kids (2 & less than 1 yo) I figured that I need (and also want) to spend time with them. Therefore I'm a real ass on myself productivity-wise. I made it a rule, that everything must be done within 6 hours tops. Hence the 5 to 6 hours a day, Monday to Friday.

It depends for me. Some days, 8+ of actual productivity (whether it be programming, communication, etc.). Other days it can be closer to 4-5.

Lately ive been slacking a bit on my productivity. Of honest hard direct task completing for my Company, i am doing basically 3 hours on average a day. Ive been tracking my hours for around 3 or 4 months now i think. I am still in high school though so my school work wastes alot of time for me. No social media either.

Do meetings count as being productive? :) Take those out and during my normal workday, I get a solid 6 in. Before and after normal working hours is when productivity really kicks in because no one can distract/bother me. Usually get another 2-3 after work hours.

I'd say... honestly, 4-5 hours of great, honest coding work; the rest is sort of messing around in a semi-productive way.

Usually about 7 :)

How about you?