While roadmap item 576749 recently updated its general availability target to March 2027 (following an initial March 2025 preview milestone and shifting from earlier archived release-plan projections of September 2025 or September 2026), administrators do not have to wait until 2027 to test the waters. According to Microsoft Learn documentation, the app is already accessible as a production-ready preview (Dynamics 365 Time Entry (Production Ready Preview)), provided an organization meets the version prerequisites and a system administrator explicitly shares the solution with users.
Here is a complete breakdown of what the mobile app actually delivers today, where the roadmap vision diverges from current documentation, the hidden traps around time-zone handling, and how administrators can deploy it.
Roadmap Promises vs. Current Preview Reality
In the enterprise software world, roadmap entries and live documentation don't always sing from the exact same hymn sheet. Understanding the nuances between what Microsoft's roadmap describes and what Microsoft Learn currently documents is essential for IT admins setting expectations with project managers.
- Deployment Scope & Licensing: The roadmap entry and archived 2024 release wave 2 plans state that the mobile app targets project team members on Lite as well as resource-based and nonstocked deployments of Project Operations. In Microsoft Learn's active technical guides for the app, the supported scope is listed as Project Operations Core and Project Operations Integrated with ERP, requiring users to hold a valid Team Member or Full Project Operations license.
- The Missing Outlook and To-Do Aggregation: Roadmap ID 576749 highlights a daily view summarizing Microsoft Outlook meetings and Microsoft To Do items so users can convert them directly into time entries. However, Microsoft Learn's current product documentation for the mobile app does not list an Outlook or To Do import view among the app's four active pages. While Project Operations has worked on bringing Outlook meeting imports to the web-based Time Entry Calendar interface, admins rolling out the mobile preview today should prepare users for four core mobile tabs: My Time, My Work, My Week, and Timer.
- Bidirectional Sync: Any time entries created, modified, submitted, or recalled in the mobile canvas app synchronize directly back to the Project Operations or Project Operations Team Member web application, and vice versa.
Inside the App: Four Core Workflows
Because the application is built as a Microsoft Power Apps canvas app, users do not download a standalone "Project Operations" binary from the store. Instead, they access it inside the standard Power Apps mobile app on iOS or Android. Once opened, the interface is divided into four functional areas:
| App Section | Primary Function | Key Capabilities & Rules |
|---|---|---|
| My Time | Default landing page & daily ledger | Displays day-wise entries and a header total of submitted/approved hours. Aligns week boundaries with the Project Operations web grid. Includes a persistent + button for Quick Create. |
| My Work | Assigned project & task directory | Lists active project assignments, showing role, end date, and logged hours. Tapping Create on a task opens Quick Create with Project, Task, and Role prefilled. |
| My Week | Visual analytics & status breakdown | Renders two charts: a color-coded daily bar chart of logged hours by status, and a weekly percentage breakdown by status. Displays the active mobile device time zone. |
| Timer | Live stopwatch for granular work | Lets users start/stop a live clock while working, then convert the timestamped recording into a time entry with the duration pre-populated. |
Logging and Managing Entries
Microsoft Learn's usage guide outlines three ways to log hours:
- Quick Create (
+button): Available from any screen. Users fill in Duration, Project, Task, and Role. Note that if you are logging a Work type entry through the app, both the Project and Task fields are strictly mandatory. - From Assignments (
My Work): If your organization uses resource assignments in project planning, users can pick an assigned task and tap Create to skip manual project and role selection. - Stopwatch (
Timer): Users tap Start/Play when beginning a task and Stop when finished. Microsoft's timer logic enforces a specific rounding rule: stopped recordings are rounded to the nearest minute, and any recording under 60 seconds automatically defaults to one minute. Unused recordings can be deleted or converted via the Create button.
Multi-Select, Submissions, and Recalls
On the My Time tab, users can tap the white space next to multiple entries to batch-process their week, though the available buttons adapt strictly to entry statuses:
- Editing and Deleting: Only entries in an editable state (Draft or Returned) can be modified or deleted. If a user multi-selects five Draft entries and accidentally includes one Submitted or Approved entry, the Delete button disappears entirely.
- Submitting and Recalling: Users can batch-submit selected Draft or Returned entries. Conversely, if all selected entries are in a Submitted or Approved state, users can tap Recall. Recalling an entry that has already been Approved triggers a mandatory prompt requiring the user to type a justification for the recall request.
Crucial Gotchas: Time Zones and Accessibility
Before handing this app over to a global consulting workforce, IT administrators and project management offices (PMOs) need to account for two documented quirks in Microsoft's implementation.
1. The Device Time Zone Override
What happens when a consultant based in New York flies to London or Tokyo and logs time from their hotel room? According to Microsoft Learn's mobile app overview, the Time Entry Mobile App uses the local time zone of the mobile device as the governing time zone for any entries created in the app.
Crucially, this overrides the user's personalization settings in Project Operations. Even if a consultant has locked their Project Operations web profile to Eastern Time, the mobile app will stamp new entries using the phone's current location-based time zone (which is prominently displayed on the My Week page). Traveling staff should be briefed on this behavior so date boundaries on their timesheets don't shift unexpectedly across midnight.
2. Known Accessibility Limitations
For organizations with strict accessibility compliance requirements, Microsoft Learn candidly documents four unresolved screen-reader issues in the current preview:
- Screen readers do not announce accurate labels for the expand, collapse, and pin controls on the My Work page.
- On the My Week charts, screen readers cannot read out duration values and may occasionally read hidden labels aloud.
- Certain page headings and component states are not announced.
- After activating the calendar control inside the new time entry dialog, screen-reader focus fails to return to the calendar control.
Step-by-Step Admin Guide: Enabling the App
Although the roadmap lists the feature as enabled for admins/makers automatically, end users will see nothing in their mobile app until an administrator shares the canvas app inside each target environment.
Prerequisites
- Dynamics 365 Project Operations version:
4.124.0.0or later. - Licensing: Users require a valid Team Member or Full Project Operations license.
- Mobile Client: Users must install the Microsoft Power Apps mobile application from the Apple App Store or Google Play Store.
How to Share the App in Power Apps
- Sign in to Microsoft Power Apps with administrator privileges.
- Use the environment picker in the top navigation bar to select the specific Project Operations environment where your team members work.
- In the left navigation pane, select Solutions.
- Above the solutions grid, switch the filter tab to All so managed system solutions are visible.
- Locate TimeEntryMobile in the list and select its link in the Display name column to open the solution's Objects view.
- Find the canvas app named Dynamics 365 Time Entry (Production Ready Preview), select the Commands menu (
...), and choose Share. - Grant access using one of two methods:
- Specific users: Type the email addresses of individual project team members.
- Organization-wide: Type
Everyoneand select Everyone in<organization name>from the dropdown menu.
- Select Share to commit the permissions.
Admin Tip: You only need to perform this sharing step once per environment, but if your consultants log time across multiple Project Operations environments (such as separate regional or subsidiary instances), you must repeat this procedure in every environment they use. To revoke permissions or promote a user to Co-owner later, return to the TimeEntryMobile solution, open Share, and select Manage Access.
How End Users Launch the App
Once shared, team members simply open the Power Apps mobile app on iOS or Android, sign in with their standard Project Operations corporate credentials, navigate to the All apps view, and tap Dynamics 365 Time Entry (Production Ready Preview).
Summary for Enterprise IT and PMOs
The Dynamics 365 Time Entry Mobile App is a pragmatic, much-needed modernization for Project Operations. By packaging the experience as a Power Apps canvas app inside the existing TimeEntryMobile solution, Microsoft gives organizations an immediate way to reduce timesheet delinquency without deploying custom mobile code. While admins should keep an eye on Roadmap ID 576749 as Microsoft works toward its updated March 2027 general availability milestone—and potentially brings the promised Outlook and Microsoft To Do meeting summaries into the mobile interface —the current production-ready preview is well worth enabling in a test or pilot environment today.