Comparison

Google Forms vs
Survey Everywhere

Different tools for different jobs — here's how to tell which one is yours.

Get a demo → Same-day consultation available.

Google Forms is free, but "free" stops covering the job once a survey needs to live inside a course or route on more than one condition. Survey Everywhere adds what Google Forms doesn't have at all — native LTI 1.3 delivery inside Canvas, Blackboard, Brightspace, and Moodle, plus true question-level branching instead of section-only logic.

 

Author Transparency Note: This comparison was written by Survey Everywhere. We've aimed to give an honest account of where Google Forms performs better, and where it doesn't. For the full picture across all [eight] tools in this category, see the hub page.

  •  

The bottom line

 

Survey Everywhere is the better choice for research instruments, course evaluations, and institutional surveys that need advanced logic, anonymous roll-ups, and SPSS-ready exports. Google Forms is the better choice for fast, free, collaborative forms on campuses that run Google Workspace, where simplicity and a direct link to Sheets matter most. The LMS gap is significant: Survey Everywhere integrates natively with Canvas, Blackboard, Brightspace, and Moodle; Google's Assignments LTI officially supports Canvas, Schoology, and Moodle, but not Blackboard or Brightspace.

Feature by feature

Everything below is included in every Survey Everywhere campus license. Google Forms pricing and LMS availability vary by contract.

At a Glance

At a Glance comparison
Feature Survey Everywhere Google Forms
Best for Campus-wide surveying: course evaluations, research, and institutional surveys Fast, free, collaborative forms, sign-ups, and quizzes
Cost Fixed annual campus pricing Free with Google Workspace for Education
Setup and ease of use Built for first-time builders; launch from the LMS Very easy; real-time co-editing; basic logic

Pricing & Licensing

Pricing & Licensing comparison
Feature Survey Everywhere Google Forms
No response caps ✓ No published limit; bounded by the linked Google Sheet
No survey caps ✓ ✓
Fixed Pricing ✓ ✓ Free
No overage fees ✓ ✓
Everything Included ✓ ✗ Gemini requires Education Plus or an AI add-on

LMS Integration

LMS Integration comparison
Feature Survey Everywhere Google Forms
Canvas certified ✓ ✗ No Forms-specific Canvas Certified integration
Canvas embedded Included Via Google Assignments LTI
Blackboard, Brightspace & Moodle integration Included Moodle only via Assignments; Blackboard and Brightspace not supported
LMS survey creation Included Via Assignments (Canvas, Moodle)
LMS survey sharing Included Via Assignments (Canvas, Moodle)
LMS quizzing Included Via Assignments (Canvas, Moodle)
LMS participation / scoring Included ✗
LMS grading Included Grade sync via Assignments
LMS distribution Included Via Assignments (Canvas, Moodle)
Assign surveys to courses and groups Included Via Assignments (Canvas, Moodle)

Survey Features

Survey Features comparison
Feature Survey Everywhere Google Forms
Question settings ✓ ✓
Branding for surveys and pages ✓ Limited (theme and header image)
Survey and organizational settings ✓ ✓
Survey invitation emails ✓ ✓ Basic (send by email)
Reminder and confirmation emails ✓ Response receipts only; no reminders
Visibility, branching & skip logic ✓ Section-based branching only
Choice and question randomization ✓ ✓
Matrix questions (incl. multi-question Likert) ✓ ✓ Grids
Piped text ✓ ✗
Loop and merge ✓ ✗
Participant file upload ✓ ✓ Requires Google sign-in
Create survey from external document (AI) ✓ Gemini (Education Plus or AI add-on)

Reporting & Analysis

Reporting & Analysis comparison
Feature Survey Everywhere Google Forms
Results sharing ✓ ✓
Export results ✓ SPSS and Excel ✓ Google Sheets and CSV
AI data analysis ✓ Experimental (Workspace Labs)
Advanced reporting ✓ ✗ Summary charts
Admin reporting ✓ ✗
Anonymity details ✓ Limited: domain-restricted forms require sign-in

Security & Administration

Security & Administration comparison
Feature Survey Everywhere Google Forms
SAML / SCIM ✓ ✓ Via Google Workspace
User roles and management ✓ ✓ Via Workspace admin
Custom and private domain ✓ ✗
Sharing / teams ✓ ✓
Public API ✓ ✓ Google Forms API
GDPR compliance ✓ ✓
WCAG 2.2 AA compliance ✓ X - WCAG 2.2 AA not publicly confirmed for Forms
ISO 27001 + 27701 compliance ✓ ✓ Google Workspace certifications; Forms-specific scope not publicly clear
SOC 2 Type II ✓ ✓ Via Google Workspace SOC reporting; Forms-specific scope not publicly clear

Which tool is right for you

The decision usually comes down to your use case, not the tools themselves. Here's a quick filter.

Choose...

Choose... comparison
Survey Everywhere if... Google Forms if...
Research instruments need piped text, loop and merge, or multi-path logic Your survey is short and doesn't need advanced logic
Course evaluations need anonymous responses and completion tracking at the same time Cost is the deciding factor and your campus already runs Google Workspace
Surveys need to launch inside Blackboard or Brightspace, as well as Canvas and Moodle Real-time co-editing and a live Google Sheet are what your team needs most
Results need role-based dashboards for instructors, chairs, and administrators Results only need to reach the survey owner
Data needs to go straight into SPSS You're running a quick quiz, sign-up, or RSVP form

How each tool performs by scenario

Both tools can handle a research survey. The differences show up in specific conditions. Below is a direct comparison across six common campus use cases.

comparison
Scenario Survey Everywhere Google Forms
Course evaluations Yes — roster-aware delivery via LTI 1.3, anonymous aggregation by section, and department and college roll-ups. Limited — anonymity requires turning off email collection, and restricting to your domain forces sign-in, which can lower trust. No roll-ups.
Faculty research study Yes — visual branching, piped text, loop and merge, and SPSS export, with no response caps. Limited — works for simple instruments. Branching is section-based only, with no native piping or SPSS export.
Campus-wide deployment Yes — fixed-price campus licence, role-based dashboards, SSO, and all four LMS integrations included. Yes for everyday forms — already deployed wherever Workspace is. No central reporting across departments.
New-student outreach Yes — welcome surveys and orientation check-ins delivered inside the LMS, with completion tracking by cohort. Yes — fast to build and share. Tracking completion by cohort takes manual work in Sheets.
Campus climate study Yes — multi-path logic, authenticated LMS or SAML responses, and anonymous aggregation where needed. Limited — basic logic and branding; analysis happens outside the tool.
Alumni and advancement surveys Yes — works well, though it's more tool than a two-question form needs. Very well — one of Google Forms' strongest use cases. Free, fast, and easy to co-edit.

Watch our unedited first-time tests of both tools:

Our CEO tries Survey Everywhere — unedited, no prep. Note: our CEO is familiar with this product.

Video transcript – Survey Everywhere

0:00 Hello and welcome back. Uh, so we're looking at the survey tool market. Uh, we're doing some comparisons. This is Survey Everywhere and as the CEO of Poll Everywhere, uh, I have in fact seen this.

0:13 We built this tool. Uh, so I can't do a fresh once through, uh, here. I just want to admit that off the top.

0:21 I can, however, uh, run you guys through a similar workflow and show you what it looks like. Uh, so, of course, if we wanted to make a survey here, I've already logged in.

0:31 Uh, that process I didn't do in any of the other tools. So, this is where we start. So, we have Surveys and we have Teams and we have Course Evals and Courses.

0:39 Courses, of course, are connected to the LMS and Participant Groups would be something that you uploaded if you didn't have an LMS connection.

0:45 Uh, so if if I wanted to make a new survey. Uh, I can, of course, create it with AI. I can do so manually.

0:53 Uh, I can import a Qualtrics file. Uh, I'm going to insert some text from the Berkeley, uh, Center for Teaching and Learning.

1:02 A course evaluation survey from this data site. And we're going to go ahead and use the AI, so the AI is going to show us, uh, the pieces that it's working through along the way.

1:36 Okay, so I'm going to move this out of our way and see where we are. Okay. So it looks like this, uhm, we have men 1 to max 5, so it looks like, uh, the scales came in here positively.

1:56 Of course, we could change these if we wanted to, to, you know, just for a kind. Uhm, it split this survey into some open-ended, uh, on the second page and the scale questions on one page.

2:09 I like that layout, and we can, of course, visualize our overall layout if we want to. Uh, these are the pages, and if we needed to, we could add some branching here so if we wanted to add some branching logic, so if we had, if we wanted to go to the end of the survey when, say, something on the first

2:33 survey, so if these are, uh, well-designed, so if this is five out of five, then maybe you just want to go ahead and say, uh, that's good enough.

2:43 Uh, so if this is a five out of five, then we're gonna go ahead and skip to the end of the survey.

2:49 Uh, and now we can see the branch takes us around to the end of the survey, and they wouldn't fill out the open-ended feedback.

2:56 You probably wouldn't want to do this specific change, but this just gives you an idea of, uh, how this can work.

3:05 So we go back to the editor, uh, that's still there. Um, and you see the branch logic over here. Uh, and it also shows up at the bottom here.

3:15 Um, there is, of course, you know, a variety of ways to, uh, to add things, uh, manually. Um, so if you wanted to do that, you could click here.

3:26 Uh, we could, say, add different types of questions. Um, you can also go back to the AI assistant and ask it to do things.

3:37 Um, the first three questions on page one, rating questions, rather than scale ones.

3:51 Uh, so this is just showing you that not only can you get a jump start in creating the content that you need, but, uh, you can also use the AI to make edits.

4:03 Uh, and it looks like we, uh, updated these. So, now we have rating questions. So these are rate out of five stars.

4:12 Uh, and if we liked that, we could, of course, change the whole thing. Uh, if we wanted to preview the difference, uh, then this is what this looks like.

4:22 So you go through one at a time and you rate. Uhm, and so I think this looks, you know, kind of like what I expected.

4:30 So we built a course evaluation survey pretty quickly here. And if we go ahead and publish this, uhm, we can make a public link for it as well.

4:39 Uh, we can name it Public CE1. Uh, we could limit it to the organization. And we could, uh, put it into a course if we wanted to, or limit it to a participation group.

4:55 We could limit the time period of course, that would make sense for most course evaluation surveys. But for this one, we're just making a quick link.

5:02 Uh, so then if we copy that link, and we wanted to go check that out, uh, now we can do our Reading?

5:13 And I'm not reading these questions, but I'm assuming that, uh, we just need to get some answers in here, so we can see some of the other pieces here, uhm, well, uh, Cheeseburger selection is really what did it for me.

5:37 Uh, and then as far as what one change would most improvement, uhm, Bacon, yeah, I think that's the answer in this case, so, it's important feedback for the instructor, and now we have completed this, and if we go ahead and close, uh, that window, uh, we can go back to our, Oh, well, that's editing.

6:00 I think we can go back to our. Our survey, uhm, and so that's in the distribute, if we go back to build, we can see it, but now we have some results.

6:09 So if we take a look at our results, uh, we got a couple of, uh, participants, only one completed it, looks like somebody else loaded the link, maybe when we clicked on it a second to go, and you can see how it how they replied, uhm, how the distribution looks, uh, you can see by color breakdown what

6:33 this looks like, we can see the, the feedback there, uhm, we can break this down by participants, of course, we can also look by question, uh, let's see, we want to look at these, you know, MediR, open response questions, we can do that, can of course, uh, execute export this, or put it into a PDF, uh

6:53 , and then you can use all sorts of different tools to, uh, report on that, how you want it to, SPSS, uh, you can put it into other packages, or like R as well, uh, and so that is, uh, putting together a course evaluation survey in Survey Everywhere, uh, we think that, uh, Atlassian, how it's connected

7:14 with the LMSs, built with those from the beginning, uh, some of the ease of use here, some of the design features, we really, we tried to find some of the best design ideas and surveys that we could, and combine those with some of the insights from higher education with our partners, uh, and we're really

7:32 excited about what we have for you guys, uh, and, yeah, that's gonna do it for today. Survey Everywhere, uhm, and hopefully you're as excited about this part of the platform as we are.

7:43 Thanks.

Our CEO tries Google Forms for the first time — unedited, no prep, no retakes.

Video transcript – Google Forms

0:01 Alright. Welcome back. So, this time we are checking out, uh, this is Google Forms. And we're gonna play around, we're gonna make some course evaluation surveys on a few different platforms that make surveys, uh, including survey everywhere.

0:16 And we're gonna do some of the same first time through reaction videos that we did for our polling comparisons, uh, on the poll everywhere site.

0:26 Uh, and I loaded up, uh, the Google Forms site and I noticed that they have had this template. So I thought I could go ahead with starting here.

0:38 And we see, you know, maybe we'd want to put in our course name. Of course, you know, of course name is TMNT.

0:51 If you were there for the polling comparisons, then you'll understand. So we have some Some great questions, those are useful, and let's see, let's see if this suggests works.

1:08 Let's try, it looks like, yeah, maybe we'll add those. Okay, so a little bit of AI assistance, we could start something for scratch.

1:25 but I think I'm okay with this template so let's go ahead and publish and I will allow anybody with the link here I'm gonna try to reply to this survey while here and let's see.

1:54 So one thing that you notice here is with the class name I can reply but you know I'm not getting any inputs here from who I am or connection with my identity and that's true on the screen that I'm looking at as well and we can choose a few answers here and I'm just gonna do that as quickly as I can

2:29 and submit results all right and now we have a quick response in here so we You can see some for the class name.

2:47 You can see an individual response. And I guess we get one of one so we could flip through those. We could go question by question for the reporting.

3:00 Oh, it looks like that one I may not have answered. I believe I did answer these. Oh, this is the response.

3:09 Oh, this is a little bit hard to visualize. okay so then yeah this is more what I expected in terms of visualization for those but this is how this reporting output is going to look we got some color full bar graphs I didn't respond to a few of these questions I did put in the start rating yeah and there

3:37 we go we have you know a quick course evaluation that we were able to send out that we had a response on go straight into a Google sheet I think for a lot of applications this would certainly be sufficient especially if you were running you know a summer course that was you know extracurricular or a

4:02 nonprofit course maybe for training I think this will take care of your needs perfectly well and I assume the AI assistant here would be able to create quite a bit more in terms of you know questions and visuals and everything so yeah all right well that is course evaluation for Google forms, we're going

4:26 to check out several more in this series so yeah check those out as you're interested. Thanks.


Pricing and limits

 

Survey Everywhere:

Campus-wide deployments are priced better than other survey platforms, with greater savings when bundled with Poll Everywhere. Everything in the Pricing & Licensing table above is included in the campus license.

 

Google Forms:

Google Forms is free with Google Workspace for Education Fundamentals. Gemini features in Forms require Education Plus or a paid AI add-on. There's no published per-form response limit, though large forms are bounded by the linked Google Sheet, and file-upload questions require respondents to sign in with a Google account.

 

What usually triggers a procurement conversation:

Procurement typically enters when a team outgrows Forms: research that needs advanced logic or SPSS, course evaluations that need anonymous roll-ups, or leadership that wants reporting across departments. Because Forms is free, the comparison usually centers on the cost of the gaps: staff time, workarounds, and separate point tools.


Switching between Survey Everywhere and Google Forms

 

Moving from Google Forms to Survey Everywhere:

Survey Everywhere can import surveys from other tools and uses AI to keep logic and page breaks intact as you move. Forms surveys are usually short, so the rebuild is fast. Past responses stay in Google Sheets or can be downloaded as CSV.

 

Moving from Survey Everywhere to Google Forms:

Survey Everywhere content does not export to Google Forms, so surveys would be rebuilt. Results export cleanly to SPSS and Excel. If your use case is shifting toward short, free forms, the tradeoff is losing advanced logic, anonymous roll-ups, and role-based reporting in exchange for a tool you already have.

What changes when the
caps come off

∞
unlimited surveys and responses on campus licences
4
native LMS integrations included, not sold separately
0
overage fees, implementation fees, or training costs

Ready to replace
Google Forms?

We'll map your current Google Forms contract against a Survey Everywhere campus license and show you the difference in writing.