When it comes to creating robust, dynamic, and visually appealing forms or surveys, developers often face a tricky dilemma. Many tools on the market limit customizability and require risking sensitive user data by storing it in a third-party cloud. On the other hand, custom-built survey solutions are expensive, time-consuming to develop, and require a dedicated team to maintain. This is where Survey Creator, part of the comprehensive SurveyJS library suite, truly stands out.

SurveyJS is an ecosystem of libraries built for developers to design, implement, and manage surveys, quizzes, and forms with remarkable ease and flexibility. At its heart lies Survey Creator, a fully customizable form builder that integrates seamlessly into any JavaScript application and works with virtually any backend system. But to truly appreciate what makes Survey Creator so powerful, it's essential to understand the ecosystem it belongs to.

SurveyJS is more than just a form builder. It's a suite of tools tailored for modern application development. The core components include:

• Survey Creator
  A drag-and-drop form builder for creating and editing JSON-driven forms. It automatically generates form definitions (schemas) in JSON format, which are then used by all other SurveyJS libraries.

• Form Library
  A runtime engine to display and run surveys or forms generated by Survey Creator. It works across all major JavaScript frameworks—React, Angular, Vue, or vanilla JavaScript—and renders forms dynamically based on their JSON schema.

• Dashboard
  An analytics tool for visualizing survey data through charts and tables. It works with a SurveyJS form JSON schema to understand data types for visualization and uses user responses to populate the dashboard with relevant survey data.

• PDF Generator
  Generates printable PDF versions of your forms. If needed, the generated PDF forms can also be pre-filled with user responses collected through Form Library.

While each component serves its unique purpose, Survey Creator stands out as a user-friendly workbench where surveys, quizzes, and forms come to life.

At its core, Survey Creator is a no-code form-building solution with the flexibility to cater to diverse use cases, from simple feedback forms to highly dynamic, logic-driven questionnaires. Unlike many other form builders, which are often standalone applications with limited integration and customization options, Survey Creator is designed to be integrated directly into your JavaScript application, offering total control over functionality, styling, and backend implementation.

With Survey Creator, forms are represented as JSON schemas. This schema-driven approach allows developers to export forms as JSON, save them to a database, and dynamically load them into applications. When an update is required, a form can be re-imported or accessed through the admin UI to adjust its layout or behavior using the Survey Creator drag-and-drop interface.

What truly sets Survey Creator apart is its dual appeal. Non-technical users can effortlessly design surveys using the drag-and-drop interface, while developers can programmatically fine-tune every aspect of the form builder, tailoring its appearance and functionality to their users' needs.

Survey Creator isn't just another form builder. Its distinction lies in several key areas.

Many form builders limit their backend compatibility, but Survey Creator is designed with a front-end-only approach that enables seamless integration with any backend. Whether you're using Node.js, ASP.NET, PHP, or custom APIs, you can easily connect and manage survey data independently. This setup ensures you have full control over your data, user management, and server-side code, without any limitations from SurveyJS.

For backend integration examples, you can refer to our resources here:

• Backend Integration Examples
• Backend Integration Documentation

Developers can integrate Survey Creator into any JavaScript application, be it React, Angular, Vue, or plain JavaScript. Its modular design ensures compatibility without imposing constraints.

Survey Creator's Toolbox is a powerful component designed to give users full control over the questions and panels available for survey creation. By using its extensive customization options, developers can fine-tune the Toolbox look, content and behavior to match specific requirements. Here's how it can be customized.

The Toolbox adapts to screen sizes with its full and compact modes. In full mode, users see both icons and labels for all elements, while compact mode displays only icons, saving screen space. Developers can toggle these modes or let the Toolbox switch automatically.

Developers can limit the question and panel types displayed in the Toolbox, showing only the elements relevant to their use case.

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Categorized items reduce the time spent searching for the right element. Developers can create custom categories, making it easier for end users to locate related questions and panels.

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Subitems allow developers to define variations of standard question types. This way, users can pick from predefined variations without additional configuration. For example, a "Long Text" question could include subitems for limited character input or specific text formatting.

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Developers can extend the Toolbox with custom question or panel types, integrating them seamlessly into the survey builder. To learn more about custom questions, refer to the following help topics for detailed instructions:

• Create Specialized Question Types
• Create Composite Question Types

The Property Grid further enhances customizability. Organized in a tree structure, the grid provides easy navigation through form elements and their properties.

Developers can tweak settings for every element, from the look to the behavior, or even customize the grid itself to better fit their workflow. Here's how it can be customized.

Developers can restrict access to specific properties by hiding them from the Property Grid. This can be done for individual properties or groups of properties.

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The Property Grid allows developers to override default values for specific properties. For example, they can ensure a particular setting is always enabled or has predefined parameters.

Hints or tooltips can be added to property editors to help users better understand the purpose and functionality of each property and reduce errors when setting property values. Hints are particularly helpful for new users, offering on-the-spot guidance without the need for additional documentation. Help texts can be global, type-specific, or context-specific.

Developers can add new custom properties to extend the Property Grid and enable functionality that is not available out of the box. To learn more about custom properties in the Property Grid, refer to the following help topic:

Add Custom Properties to Question Types

Survey Creator provides developers with complete control over its appearance and enables them to create and apply a custom theme to its UI using CSS variables. Overriding the default styles with custom values ensures that Survey Creator aligns seamlessly with your branding and delivers a cohesive user experience.

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Survey Creator's interface is divided into several tabs, each designed to streamline specific tasks.

The drag-and-drop Survey Creator interface makes form creation effortless for anyone. It's perfect for arranging form elements visually, letting end users focus on layout and structure without worrying about underlying code.

Testing a survey is as crucial as designing it. The Preview tab allows users to interact with their forms in real-time, ensuring everything works as intended. It even simulates how forms will look on different devices, from desktops to smartphones.

Styling surveys has never been simpler. With the Themes tab, users can modify colors, fonts, and layouts without writing CSS. Developers can save custom survey themes in JSON format and make them available in the Theme tab for reuse across multiple forms, ensuring consistent branding.

Dynamic functionality is a hallmark of Survey Creator. The Logic tab provides a centralized view of all conditional rules applied to the survey. Whether showing or hiding questions based on responses or triggering actions, this tab is your go-to for behavior configuration.

Every form in Survey Creator generates a JSON schema in real time. This schema defines the form's layout, its behavior, and content. Users can export this schema to a database for further rendering in their applications or import an existing schema to make modifications using the drag-and-drop Survey Creator interface.

Survey Creator makes localization of survey UI elements seamless. Supporting over 50 languages, it ships with ready-to-use dictionary files. Developers can easily load these translations or customize them, ensuring the survey experience feels native to its audience.

To learn more about survey localization, refer to the following help topic:

Localization & Globalization

Additionally, the tabs themselves are configurable—developers can rearrange, hide, or show specific tabs to suit the workflow of their end users.

Survey Creator stands apart from traditional form-building tools thanks to its rich feature set, designed to deliver unparalleled flexibility, customizability, and ease of use. Let's take a closer look at its standout features and how they benefit users.

Survey Creator is fully open source on GitHub, meaning developers have complete access to its codebase and can tweak every aspect of the tool, from UI elements to core functionality.

The intuitive drag-and-drop interface makes form creation accessible to non-technical users, not just developers. Users can visually design forms by simply arranging components in the builder without touching a single line of code.

Survey Creator doesn't lock you into proprietary storage or backend systems. It is designed to integrate effortlessly with any storage solution and backend architecture, whether you're using a cloud, an on-premises database, or a custom API.

Survey Creator offers a robust set of built-in question types including Multi-Select Dropdown, Dynamic Matrix, Image Picker, Ranking, Multiple Textboxes, Multi-Select Matrix, and many more. Additionally, developers can define custom question types to address unique requirements.

Dynamic functionality, including conditional logic and calculated values, enables forms to react intelligently to user inputs. Conditional logic, for example, can hide or show questions or even automatically complete the survey based on previous responses, while calculated values perform real-time computations in the background.

Survey Creator not only enables developers to localize the surveys it produces but also its own interface. This way users speaking different languages can easily work with the tool. Survey Creator UI supports over 30 languages out of the box, and developers can add new languages and modify existing translations to meet the linguistic needs of diverse audiences, making Survey Creator a perfect choice for global applications.

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JSON is a widely supported, easy-to-parse format. Survey Creator generates forms as JSON schemas that encapsulate the survey's structure, layout, and behavior. These schemas can be exported, stored, and reused across projects or environments. Forms can be dynamically loaded and rendered in your applications, enabling real-time updates without rebuilding the form manually.

Survey Creator isn't just a tool. It's a survey platform for building intelligent, customizable forms that fit seamlessly into modern web applications. Whether you're gathering feedback, creating quizzes, or designing enterprise-level data collection systems, Survey Creator equips you with the tools you need while offering the flexibility to grow and adapt.

Its open-source nature ensures that you're not locked into a rigid solution, while its intuitive UI makes it accessible to a wide range of users. With Survey Creator, you're not just building forms—you're building a smarter, more secure survey solution.

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