Odoo project management covers the full job for a Saudi services business: planning tasks and milestones, recording time on timesheets, invoicing by milestone or by hours worked, and checking profit per project. The Project app is part of Odoo Community. Gantt views, the Timesheets app, Planning and Documents need Odoo Enterprise, which most service firms choose.
Summary answer: Odoo Project organises work into projects, tasks, stages and milestones, with sub-tasks, task dependencies and recurring tasks. Staff log hours on tasks through timesheets, and those hours flow to the sales order. You can bill a project at a fixed price, by milestone, or on time and materials using the Based on Timesheets invoicing policy. Reaching a milestone makes that share of the order ready to invoice, but you still create the invoice yourself. A profitability panel on each billable project compares revenue (timesheets, materials, invoices, subscriptions) with costs (employee time, purchases, expenses). Customers can follow shared projects through the portal. Odoo Enterprise adds the Gantt view, the Timesheets app with timers and validation, the Planning app for staff schedules and the Documents app. In Saudi Arabia, project invoices go through the same ZATCA-ready sales journal as every other invoice.
What the Odoo Project app covers
Odoo Project is where delivery work lives. Each project has its own task board, team, customer, deadlines and settings. Because it shares one database with Sales, Accounting, Purchase and HR, a project is never an island. The sales order that created it, the hours booked against it and the invoices raised from it are all linked.
The question most buyers ask first is which parts need Odoo Enterprise. The table below is based on the modules published in Odoo’s open-source code and its feature documentation.
| Feature | Odoo Community | Odoo Enterprise |
|---|---|---|
| Projects, tasks, stages, sub-tasks, milestones | Yes | Yes |
| Basic time logging on tasks | Yes | Yes |
| Billing by timesheets or milestones from a sales order | Yes | Yes |
| Gantt view for projects and tasks | No | Yes |
| Timesheets app (grid view, timer, reminders, validation) | No | Yes |
| Planning app (staff schedules by role) | No | Yes |
| Documents app (shared files per project) | No | Yes |
| Full Accounting app (bank reconciliation, financial reports) | No | Yes |
A small team that only needs a task board can start on Community. A firm that bills clients for time, manages several projects at once and wants managers to see who is overloaded will almost always need Enterprise. You can browse the wider set of apps on our Odoo apps overview.
Planning the work: tasks, stages, milestones and Gantt
Tasks and stages
Every project has a Kanban board. Columns are stages you define, such as New, In Progress, Client Review and Done. Each task carries an assignee, a deadline, tags, a priority, allocated hours and a status that shows whether it is in progress, waiting or blocked. Tasks can have sub-tasks, so a phase like “Network design” can hold the smaller jobs under it.
Recurring tasks repeat on a schedule you set. They suit monthly reports, quarterly health checks or any service you deliver on a cycle. Task dependencies let you mark that one task is blocked by another, so the team knows what must finish first.
Milestones
Milestones are the key steps a project must reach, such as “Design approved” or “Go-live”. You enable them in the project settings, give each one a name and a deadline, and link tasks to it. According to Odoo’s milestones documentation, a milestone is marked as reached automatically once all its linked tasks are done. Milestones are useful for long or high-value projects, and they are also the basis for milestone billing, covered below.
Gantt view and the Planning app
With Enterprise, the Gantt view shows tasks as bars on a timeline. You can drag a task to move its dates, see dependencies as arrows, and see milestones as diamond markers that turn red if missed. This is the view most project managers use for weekly reviews.
The Planning app answers a different question: who is working on what, and when. You create shifts by role and employee, link them to projects, and spot gaps or double-booking before they happen. For a consultancy or engineering firm, Planning is often the tool that stops one senior engineer being booked on three sites at once.
Odoo project timesheets: recording time you can bill
Timesheets are the link between work and money. Staff log hours against a task, either by typing them in or by starting a timer on the task. Each entry records the employee, the date, the hours and a short description. Managers then see hours spent against hours allocated on each task.
The Enterprise Timesheets app adds a weekly grid where staff fill in a whole week in one screen, reminders for people who forget, and a validation step so a manager approves hours before they are invoiced. Validation matters. Once hours reach an invoice, correcting them means a credit note.
Two settings shape how timesheets behave:
- Employee cost. Each employee has an hourly cost in their HR record. Odoo uses it to value time on the cost side of the project.
- Billing rates. A project can bill all staff at one rate, or bill each employee at their own rate, such as a senior consultant rate and a junior rate on the same project.
Timesheets also connect to Time Off, so approved leave appears on the employee’s timesheet and does not count as missing time.
Billing projects: fixed price, milestones, or time and materials
In Odoo, a project is usually created from a sales order. You set up a service product, choose what it creates on order (a project, a project and task, or a task), and choose its invoicing policy. When the quotation is confirmed, Odoo creates the project for you.
| Invoicing policy | How it works | Good fit |
|---|---|---|
| Prepaid / Fixed price | You invoice the agreed amount up front, before the work is done | Fixed-scope packages, prepaid support blocks |
| Based on Milestones | Reaching a milestone updates the delivered quantity on the sales order, so that share can be invoiced | Implementation, design and construction-style projects paid in stages |
| Based on Timesheets | Validated hours logged on tasks become the delivered quantity and are invoiced | Time and materials, retainers billed monthly |
| Based on Delivered Quantity (Manual) | You enter the delivered quantity yourself | Units of work that are not tracked as hours |
Two points catch new users. First, reaching a milestone does not create the invoice by itself. It makes the amount ready to invoice, and someone in finance still clicks Create Invoice. Second, one sales order can mix policies. A typical contract might hold a fixed-price design phase, milestone-based delivery and a time-and-materials line for change requests.
Materials and expenses can be billed too. Products sold on the linked sales order appear as project revenue, and expenses an employee records against the project can be re-invoiced to the customer at cost or at sales price.
Project invoicing and ZATCA
Project invoices in Saudi Arabia go through the same sales journal as any other customer invoice. If that journal is onboarded with ZATCA through Odoo’s Saudi e-invoicing module, milestone and timesheet invoices are submitted like any other tax invoice. Odoo’s Saudi documentation also covers down payment and retention invoices, which matter on staged contracts. Our guide to Odoo ZATCA e-invoicing explains the setup, and our Odoo accounting guide for Saudi Arabia covers VAT.
Project profitability: does this project make money?
Each billable project has a profitability panel on its dashboard. Odoo’s profitability documentation lists what it pulls in:
- Revenue: timesheets (grouped by invoicing policy), materials from linked sales orders, customer invoices, subscriptions, down payments and re-invoiced expenses.
- Costs: timesheets valued at each employee’s hourly cost, purchase orders once the vendor bill is posted, and expenses.
Revenue is split into Sold, Delivered and Invoiced. Costs are split into Expected, To bill and Billed. So a manager can see mid-project that, for example, 70% of the hours are used but only 40% of the value is invoiced, and act before the margin is gone.
There is one rule to get right at setup: a record only appears on the panel if it is linked to both the project and its analytic account. If purchase lines or expenses are not tagged to the project, the panel will look healthier than reality. This is a setup and training issue, not a software limit.
Project updates add a short status report on top: a traffic-light status, progress and a written note, with the profitability figures alongside. Many firms use these for a weekly or monthly review with management or the client.
Documents, collaboration and the customer portal
Each task has a chatter thread where the team posts messages, logs notes, schedules follow-up activities and attaches files. Emails sent to a project’s alias can create tasks, so client requests do not get lost in personal inboxes.
With Enterprise, the Documents app gives each project a shared folder for drawings, contracts, sign-offs and reports. Files attached to tasks can be found there, and you can request a missing document from a colleague or client.
The customer portal lets you share a project with your client. Depending on the access you give, the client can view tasks and their stages, follow progress, comment, add files and see timesheets logged on the work. This cuts down the status emails that eat into a project manager’s week. You decide per project who sees what.
Example: an IT services firm running projects in Odoo
Our Odoo for IT services case study shows how this fits together for a Saudi technology firm. The client connected Odoo CRM, Project, Timesheets and Accounting so that a won opportunity became a sales order, the sales order created the project, consultants logged hours on tasks, and finance invoiced from validated timesheets and milestones. The case study sets out the setup, the delivery approach and the results the client reported.
A typical flow for a services firm looks like this:
- Sales confirms a quotation with a milestone line and a time-and-materials line.
- Odoo creates the project from a template with stages and milestones already in place.
- The project manager schedules people in Planning and sets dates in the Gantt view.
- Consultants log time daily. The manager validates hours each week.
- Finance invoices reached milestones and validated hours, and each invoice goes to ZATCA through the sales journal.
- Management reviews the profitability panel and project updates monthly.
What Odoo project management costs in Saudi Arabia
There are two costs: the Odoo subscription and the one-off implementation. At the time of writing (November 2026), the Odoo pricing page lists the Standard plan at US$16.90 (about SAR 63.38) per user per month billed yearly, and the Custom plan at US$32.00 (about SAR 120.00), with a lower price for the first 12 months. Both plans include all apps, so Project, Timesheets, Planning and Documents add no extra licence cost. Custom is needed for Odoo Studio, multi-company, the API or custom modules.
For implementation, indicative market ranges (indicative, not a quote) for a focused rollout of Project, Timesheets, Sales and Invoicing with up to 10 users sit around SAR 20,000 to SAR 60,000. Larger projects with more users, integrations or custom reports cost more. Our Odoo implementation cost guide for Saudi Arabia breaks this down, and the Odoo cost calculator gives a quick estimate.
Getting the setup right
Most problems with project software come from setup, not features. These are the decisions that matter most:
- Build project templates. Standard stages, milestones and task lists per service line save hours on every new project and keep reporting consistent.
- Decide the billing model per product. Agree with finance which services are fixed price, milestone-based or billed on timesheets before you create products.
- Set employee costs early. Without hourly costs, the profitability panel shows revenue but no real margin.
- Make timesheet validation a weekly habit. Late or unvalidated hours delay invoices.
- Link purchases and expenses to the project. Otherwise costs are missing from the panel.
- Train by role. Consultants need ten minutes on logging time. Project managers and finance need much more.
If your process needs fields or approval steps Odoo does not have, our Odoo customization services can add them, but test the standard flow first. It covers more than most firms expect.
Working with OzonLayer
OzonLayer IT Services is an official Odoo Silver Partner with three Odoo 18 certified consultants and 50+ clients served. Our Saudi office is in Riyadh. We set up Project, Timesheets, billing and ZATCA e-invoicing as part of our Odoo implementation services in Saudi Arabia, and you can see our other Saudi services on the Odoo services in KSA page.
Want to see your own projects, billing rules and reports running in Odoo before you commit? Book a free consultation with our team.
Frequently asked questions
Is Odoo Project free?
The Project app is part of Odoo Community, which is free and open source, so you can run tasks, stages, sub-tasks and milestones without a licence. Gantt views, the Timesheets app with grid and validation, the Planning app and the Documents app need Odoo Enterprise, which is paid per user per month.
Can Odoo invoice a project by milestone?
Yes. Set the service product's invoicing policy to Based on Milestones and enable milestones on the project. When a milestone is reached, Odoo updates the delivered quantity on the sales order so that share can be invoiced. Reaching a milestone does not create the invoice automatically; someone still creates it.
How does time and materials billing work in Odoo?
Use a service product with the Based on Timesheets invoicing policy. Staff log hours on the project's tasks, a manager validates them, and the validated hours become the delivered quantity on the sales order. Materials sold on the same order and re-invoiced expenses can be billed alongside the hours.
Does Odoo show profit per project?
Yes. Each billable project has a profitability panel comparing revenue from timesheets, materials, invoices and subscriptions with costs from employee time, posted vendor bills and expenses. Records only appear if they are linked to both the project and its analytic account, so setup and tagging matter.
Can my customers see project progress in Odoo?
Yes. You can share a project with a customer through the Odoo portal. Depending on the access you set, they can view tasks and stages, follow progress, comment, add files and see timesheets logged on the work. You control access per project.
Are Odoo project invoices ZATCA compliant?
Project invoices use the same sales journal as other customer invoices. If that journal is onboarded with ZATCA through Odoo's Saudi e-invoicing module, milestone and timesheet invoices are submitted like any other tax invoice. Odoo's Saudi documentation also covers down payment and retention invoices.
How much does Odoo project management cost in Saudi Arabia?
At the time of writing (November 2026), Odoo Standard is about SAR 63 per user per month billed yearly and Custom about SAR 120, with all apps included. A focused implementation for up to 10 users is indicatively SAR 20,000 to SAR 60,000. That is an indicative market range, not a quote.
