Google Forms

  Forms are among the internet's most versatile tools. Whether you need a contact form or a checkout page, a survey or a student directory, a form is all you need to easily gather that information. With Google Forms, it only takes a few minutes to make one for free.

Google Forms—along with Docs, Sheets, and Slides—is part of Google's online apps suite of tools to help you get more done in your browser for free. It's easy to use and one of the simplest ways to save data directly to a spreadsheet, and it's the best sidekick to Google Sheets' spreadsheets.

When you need to gather data for your spreadsheets, a form is your best friend. In this chapter, let's take an in-depth look at Google Forms' features, hidden tools, and add-ons to help you make the forms you need in minutes.

                

Google Forms started life as a Google Sheets feature in 2008, two years after Sheets' original launch. You could add a form to a spreadsheet, format it in a separate sheet, and see your form responses in another sheet. It was basic, but it got the job done.

Google added more features to Forms over time, then finally turned it into its own standalone app in early 2016. Today you can make and manage forms at docs.google.com/forms, with templates and quick access to all your forms in one place.

Google Forms is now a full-featured forms tool that comes free with your Google account. You can add standard question types, drag-and-drop questions in the order you like, customize the form with simple photo or color themes, and gather responses in Forms or save them to a Google Sheets spreadsheet.

The simplest way to start building a form is right from the Google Forms app. Go to docs.google.com/forms, then either choose a template or start a blank form.

There's also a link to Google Forms in Docs, Sheets, and Slides: click File -> New -> Form to start a new blank form. Or, in Google Sheets, click Tools -> Create a Form to start a blank new form that's automatically linked to that spreadsheet. That's the quickest way to get data into a new or existing spreadsheet: open the spreadsheet where you want the data, start a form, and the form responses will automatically be saved there without any extra clicks.

The Forms editor is straightforward. Your form fills the center of the screen, with space for a title and description followed by form fields. Click a form field to edit it and add a question. Use the dropdown box next to the field to choose the field type, such as multiple choice, checkboxes, short answer, and so on.
Google Forms offers several settings options. The floating toolbar on the right lets you add more form fields. On the top right menu you can change the form's color scheme, preview the form, use the Send button to share the form, and access other extra options, including installing add-ons for Forms. Switch from the Questions tab to the Responses tab in your form editor to see current responses to your form and link it to a spreadsheet.

All you need to do is add your questions and send the form out, so let's look at the form options and what you can do with each.

Google Forms Field Options

Google Forms includes 12 field types: 9 question types, along with text, photo, and video fields. Just click the + icon in the right sidebar to add a new question, or click the text, photo, or video icons to add media to your form.

Each field includes a copy button to duplicate the field, for a simple way to add similar questions to your form. There's also a delete button, options to make the field required, and a menu with extra options on the right side. You can switch question types at any time, though do note that your field settings and questions will reset if you switch from multiple choice, checkbox, or menu to any of the other question types. And, to quickly fill in questions in fields, just press enter to start adding another one.

Title and Description: The title and description fields are added automatically to every form and field—though the description is hidden by default on most fields—and you can add an extra title block anywhere with the Tt button. You can leave the title and description blank on questions, but the main form title must be filled in.

Short Answer: This field is perfect for asking for small bits of text: names, email addresses, values, and more. You get one line of text to answer the question—though your users could actually enter as much text as they want.

To make sure you get the answers you need, this field includes number, text, length, and regular expression data validations. Number validations help you watch for ranges of values, while text validations are perfect to watch for email addresses or links.

Paragraph: Much the same as the short answer field, this is a field for text—long-form text. Length and regular expression are the only data validations available here, so only use it when you want detailed feedback or longer notes in the answer.

Multiple Choice: The default field for new questions in a Google Form, multiple choice lets you list options and have users select one. You can then have the form jump to another section based on the answer or have the answer options shuffled to prevent bias.

Checkboxes: Similar to multiple choice, this field lets you list answers and have users select as many as they want. It also includes data validation to require users to select a specific number of options. It doesn't include section jumps, however.

Dropdown: Want all of the answer options in a menu? This field's for you. It's the exact same as the multiple choice field—with the same section jump and shuffle options—only this time the answers are in a menu. This is useful for keeping your form compact when there are many answer options.

Linear Scale: The field to let people select a number in a range, linear scale lets you set a scale from 0 or 1 to 2-10 with labels for the lowest and highest options. And yes, emoji work for labels, too.

Multiple Choice Grid: This is perhaps the most confusing field, as the fields are displayed in a list rather than in the grid as they'll appear to readers. Essentially, you'll add questions as rows, and options about them as columns.

You can include as many rows and columns as you want, though do note that readers will have to scroll right to see more than 6 columns on desktop browsers or just 3 columns on mobile. You might want to keep the form preview open while setting up grid questions—just tap the eye icon on the top right, and refresh that page to see your changes.

Also, in addition to the standard option to require responses, the grid lets you require a response per row and can also limit users to only one response per column.

Date: Want to ask for a specific date or time, perhaps to schedule an event or log an activity? The date field is the one you want to select. It can ask for a date and month and, optionally, the year and time as well.

Do note that the date format will be shown in the default format for your location. If your Google Account is set to US English locale, dates will be formatted as MM/DD/YYYY; UK English accounts, on the other hand, will show dates as DD/MM/YYYY. Your users will see the date options in your locale's date format, unless they're logged into their Google Account, so be sure to keep that in mind when creating forms.

Time: Time lets you request a length of time in hours, minutes, and (optionally) seconds, for a way to log how long an activity took.

Image: Google Forms lets you upload an image, insert one from a link or Google Drive, or take a photo from your own webcam (as long as you have Flash installed). Or, you can search Google Images for photos, including royalty free stock photo and images from LIFE that are licensed to use inside Google Drive.

Video: Google Forms only supports YouTube videos, which you can add either through search or with a link.

Whether you've added images or videos, your form entry will have the standard title and description, along with options to resize and show the video or image centered, left, or right aligned.

With the questions out of the way, let's pull them together and make a complete form with sections and logic to route users to the correct questions.

Form Sections

Simple contact forms only need a few fields, but longer surveys can quickly get overwhelming with dozens of questions on one page. That's where sections come in handy: They let you break your form up into chunks to answer one set of questions at a time.

Just click the last button the right toolbar to add a section below the current question. Each section includes its own title and description, along with an arrow button at the top to show or hide questions and keep your form editor tidy.

You can drag-and-drop questions between sections, but you can't rearrange full sections. You could, instead, move the questions out and then delete that section. Or, if you want to reuse a section, just click the section's menu and select Duplicate section for another copy of those questions.

That's a perfect way to start a form with logic jumps. Say you want to ask a respondent followup questions based on their answer—perhaps to ask which meat an event attendee wants, but only if they're not vegetarian.

Just add sections with the optional questions, and then either add a section jump to the individual multiple choice, checkbox, or menu questions, or to the section itself. Make sure to think through where people who shouldn't see those questions are sent, too, perhaps with alternate questions in a separate section. Or, you can send them straight to the end of the form to submit their answers, if there's nothing else to ask.

Be creative: Form sections and jumps let you turn your form into a mini-app, and they can be a great way to condense detailed surveys down into only the most important questions for each person.

Build a Quiz

Another way to make an interactive form is with Google Forms' Quiz mode. Inside your form settings, you'll find a Quizzes tab. Select Make this a quiz, and then choose whether to show the results immediately after the form is submitted or later once you review the answers. If you choose the latter, your form will need to require respondents to sign in with their Google account.

You can then choose to show missed and correct answers, as well as a value for each option if you'd like.

With that enabled, you'll see a new Answer Key button on the bottom left of each question. Click it, then select the correct answer for the question. You can optionally add answer feedback both for correct and incorrect answers, with a link for respondents to view more info if you'd like.

Note that quizzes only work with multiple choice, checkbox, and drop-down questions.

Store Form Responses in a Spreadsheet

Once you've created the form, you don't need to do anything extra to store respondents' answers in Google Forms. By default, it'll save each answer in the Responses tab, showing summary graphs and lists of answers. An individual response view shows the live form along with the results from each respondent.

That's great for quick form results, but for more tools to analyze answers, you can link your form to a Google Sheets spreadsheet. Just click the green Sheets icon in the Responses tab or click Select Response Destination in the menu, then create a new spreadsheet or select an existing one to store the answers.

Note: You can store results from multiple forms in one spreadsheet; each form's responses will be saved to a separate sheet. You cannot, however, save multiple forms' responses to a single sheet.

One great thing about saving Google Forms entries to a Google Sheets spreadsheet: It's fast. Change your form field names, and they're automatically updated in your spreadsheet. Get a new entry, and it'll show up in the spreadsheet as soon as your recipient clicks Submit.

Note: You can change form questions and answer options at any time, but if you do, it won't change entries that have already been added to your spreadsheet.

Share Your Form

You've made a form, and now it's time to share it with the world and get responses to your questions. Or perhaps you want to get feedback from your team on your form. Either way, here's what you need to do in Google Forms.

Collaborate on Forms

One of Google Forms' best features is that you can share the core form with others to let them help you build and edit the form. The same sharing features you'd expect in Google Docs and Sheets are included with Forms.

Just open the Forms menu and select Add Collaborators, then enter individual collaborators' email addresses. Or click the Change… link to make the form public to the web or just inside your organization.

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