Daily Construction Report Template (Excel)
A free Excel daily report for superintendents: weather and site conditions, manpower by trade with hours, equipment on site, work performed, deliveries, inspections and visitors, delays and issues, safety, and a manpower log that builds up over the project.
Download the Excel templateFree, no sign-up. Opens in Excel, Google Sheets and LibreOffice.
Mirage does this work from your own documents. See progress tracking
Who uses it, and when
Superintendents and foremen write the daily report at the end of each shift; project managers read it the next morning; owners and lenders often receive it weekly. Subcontractors keep their own, and their figures should match the general contractor's manpower section.
Months later, the same reports are read by claims consultants, lawyers and arbitrators: in a delay or change dispute, a daily report written the same day is often the only contemporaneous record of who was on site, what was done and what stopped the work.
What is in the file
- Daily report
- The header (project, report number, date, superintendent, weather, temperature, site conditions), manpower by trade with workers and hours (totals computed), equipment with hours used and idle, then free-text blocks for work performed, deliveries, inspections and visitors, delays and RFIs, safety and photos, and signatures.
- Manpower log
- One row per trade per day, copied from each report, so labour by trade can be totalled over the project.
- Instructions
- How to fill it, step by step.
Column by column
- Weather and temperature
- Morning and afternoon conditions and the low and high temperature. Weather delays are claimed on this record.
- Site conditions
- Mud, standing water, access closed, power out: anything that changes how the work could be done.
- Trade / subcontractor
- Each company on site, including your own crews.
- Workers and hours each
- Headcount and hours per worker; total hours computed. They should match the subcontractor's own timesheets.
- Work area / activity
- Where each crew worked and on what, in the schedule's activity terms where possible.
- Equipment, hours used, idle / down
- What was on site and whether it worked. Standby equipment on a delay day is a cost item in a claim.
- Work performed
- Progress by area, in quantities when you have them: 'level 3 east bay deck poured, 85 CY'.
- Deliveries
- Material, supplier and delivery ticket number.
- Inspections and visitors
- Who came, from which authority or company, and the outcome.
- Delays, issues, RFIs
- What stopped or slowed work, since when, and the RFI or notice it led to.
- Safety
- Incidents, near misses, the toolbox talk of the day.
How to use it
- Copy the Daily report sheet (or the file) for each day, and fill the header first thing.
- Enter the manpower and equipment by trade; totals compute.
- At the end of the shift, write the work performed by area, the deliveries with ticket numbers, inspections, delays and safety.
- Reference the photos taken that day, sign the report and have it reviewed.
- Copy the day's manpower rows into the Manpower log.
Limits
- One sheet per day: the template does not consolidate several days' text blocks; the Manpower log does that for labour only.
- The report records facts. Whether a delay is excusable or compensable is decided under the contract, using this record.
- Free-text blocks are cells: for long entries, widen the row or attach a page.
A worked example
Report 112, 7 October 2026, clear morning, light rain after 15:00, 12 to 19 °C. Manpower: ABC Forms, 8 workers × 8 hours = 64 hours on level 3 east bay formwork; Rebar Co., 6 × 8 = 48 hours; own crew, 4 × 9 = 36 hours. Total on site 18 workers, 148 hours. Equipment: tower crane TC-1, 9 hours, 0 idle.
Work performed: formwork complete level 3 east bay, rebar 60% placed, MEP sleeves set per RFI 014. Delivery: 12 t rebar, ticket 44871. Inspection: city building inspector, footing F-12 approved. Delay: concrete pour moved to 9 October due to rain forecast, notice to owner sent. Safety: toolbox talk on working at height, no incidents.
Mistakes to avoid
- Writing the report the next day, or the next week. Its value comes from being written the same day.
- Leaving delays out because they seem minor. A minor delay repeated twenty times is a claim, and only the record shows it.
- Manpower counts that do not match the subcontractors' timesheets. Reconcile them weekly.
- Opinions instead of facts: 'the steel sub is hopeless' helps nobody; '4 of 8 steel workers on site, erection 2 days behind sequence' does.
- No signature. An unsigned report is weaker evidence than a signed one.
Questions
What should a daily construction report include?
Date and weather, manpower by trade with hours, equipment on site, work performed by area, deliveries, inspections and visitors, delays and issues, safety events, and photos. It is signed by the superintendent.
Who writes the daily report?
The general contractor's superintendent, usually with input from foremen and subcontractors. Subcontractors often keep their own daily reports as well.
Why are daily reports important in disputes?
Because they are contemporaneous: written the same day, by someone on site, before anyone knew there would be a dispute. Claims for delay, disruption and changed conditions rely on them more than on any later reconstruction.
How long should daily reports be kept?
At least until the end of the limitation period for claims under the contract and the applicable law, which is often several years after completion. Your company's record retention policy and the contract set the period.
Can the manpower log replace timesheets?
No. Timesheets are the payroll record of each worker; the manpower log is a site record by trade. They should agree, and comparing them weekly is a good check.
Daily reports read against the schedule
This template records one day. Mirage deploys AI agents that read daily reports, delivery tickets and site photos and keep progress tied to the schedule and the contract, for your project managers to review.