---
title: Carry Forward Responses - SurveyJS
description: Learn how to use Carry Forward Responses technique in your SurveyJS forms. Carry forward involves taking certain answer choices from a previous question and carrying them forward to a subsequent question. This method is useful for follow-up questions where only selected or unselected items from a previous question are relevant. 
---

# How to Carry Forward Responses

## About Carry Forward Responses

Carry Forward is a survey technique that takes selected responses from one question and copies them to a subsequent question. This method ensures that follow-up questions are directly relevant to the respondent's previous answers. You can use the feature for follow-up questions that require only the items selected from a previous question or, conversely, only the items that were not selected.

## Supported Question Types

Any multi-select question type from the list below can be used as both a source and a target question:

- [Checkboxes](https://surveyjs.io/form-library/examples/create-checkboxes-question-in-javascript/)
- [Dropdown](https://surveyjs.io/form-library/examples/create-dropdown-menu-in-javascript/)
- [Tag Box](https://surveyjs.io/form-library/examples/how-to-create-multiselect-tag-box/)
- [Image Picker](https://surveyjs.io/form-library/examples/image-picker-question/)
- [Radio Group](https://surveyjs.io/form-library/examples/single-select-radio-button-group/)
- [Ranking](https://surveyjs.io/form-library/examples/add-ranking-question-to-form/)
  
## Types of Choices to Carry Forward

The **Which choice options to copy** property allows you to select what choices of a source question you want to use in the follow-up question:

- **All** - Copies all choice options from the selected source question.
- **Selected** - Dynamically copies only selected choice options.
- **Unselected** - Dynamically copies only unselected choice options.

<img src="images/eud-which-choices-to-copy.png" alt='How to use Carry Forward Responses in SurveyJS Form Builder' width="340" height="266">

The **None** and **Other** choice options are passed by default if enabled in the source question.

## Limitations

When choosing the source and target question types for Carry Forward, take into account the following factors:

- Radio Button Group and Dropdown questions do not support multiple selections; they can pass only one selected choice. For this reason, it's recommended to use them as source questions only if unselected or all choices are required for the follow-up question.
- An Image Picker question passes selected, unselected, or all image/video files if the follow-up question is also an Image Picker type. Otherwise, it passes image/video captions. You can change the selection type&mdash;single or multiple&mdash;by using the **Allow multiple selection** checkbox.
 
    <img src="images/eud-allow-multiple-selection-cf.png" alt='How to allow multiple selection in the Image Picker' width="332" height="324">

- A Ranking question can be used as a source of all choices only, unless the **Allow selective ranking** property checkbox is selected.

    <img src="images/eud-allow-selective-ranking.png" alt='How to enable selective ranking in the Ranking question' width="332" height="284">

- Checkboxes and Multi-Select Dropdown (Tag Box) can pass one or multiple selected choices, depending on the value set for the **Maximum choices to select** property.

    <img src="images/eud-max-choices-to-select.png" alt='How to set the maximum number of choices a user can select' width="331" height="244">

## Examples

### Carry Forward Selected Responses from a Tag Box to a Dropdown

1. Add a **Multi-Select Dropdown** question to the design surface.
2. Assign it a **Question name** (ID) and a user-friendly **Question title**.

    <img src="images/eud-tag-box.png" alt='Tag Box configuration' width="1558" height="749">
3. Under **Choice Options**, populate the Tag Box with choices.
4. Add a **Dropdown** question to the design surface.
5. Under **Choice Options**, locate the **Copy choices from the following question** setting and select a source question ID (**Question name** value) from the drop-down list of available questions.
6. Locate the **Which choice options to copy** setting and click **Selected**.

    <img src="images/eud-dropdown.png" alt='How to carry forward selected responses from a Tag Box to a Dropdown' width="1558" height="748">
7. Switch to the **Preview** tab to test the configuration.

    <img src="images/eud-example-one.png" alt='Preview carrying forward selected responses from a Tag Box to a Dropdown' width="914" height="540">

### Carry Forward Selected Responses from Checkboxes to a Radio Button Group

1. Add a **Checkboxes** question to the design surface.
2. Assign it a **Question name** (ID) and a user-friendly **Question title**.

    <img src="images/eud-checkboxes.png" alt='Checkboxes configuration' width="1519" height="718">
3. Under **Choice Options**, populate the Checkboxes question with choices.
4. To restrict the number of items a respondent can select, under **Choice Options**, locate the **Minimum choices to select** and **Maximum choices to select** settings and enter the required values.

    <img src="images/eud-min-max-cf.png" alt='Restrict the number of items a respondent can select in a Checkboxes question' width="333" height="384">
5. Add a **Radio Button Group** question to the design surface.
6. Under **Choice Options**, locate the **Copy choices from the following question** setting and select a source question ID (**Question name** value) from the drop-down list of available questions.
7. Locate the **Which choice options to copy** setting and click **Selected**.

    <img src="images/eud-radio-button-group.png" alt='Carry forward selected responses from a Checkboxes question to a Radio Button Group' width="1518" height="649">
8. Switch to the **Preview** tab to test the configuration.

    <img src="images/eud-checkboxes-radio-button-group.png" alt='Preview carrying forward selected responses from a Checkboxes question to a Radio Button Group' width="967" height="693">

### Carry Forward Unselected Responses Between Radio Button Groups

1. Add a **Radio Button Group** question to the design surface.
2. Assign it a **Question name** (ID) and a user-friendly **Question title**.
3. Under **Choice Options**, populate the Radio Button Group with choices.
4. Add another **Radio Button Group** question to the design surface.
5. Under **Choice Options**, locate the **Copy choices from the following question** setting and select a source question ID (**Question name** value) from the drop-down list of available questions.
6. Locate the **Which choice options to copy** setting and click **Unselected**.

    <img src="images/eud-unselected.png" alt='Carry forward unselected responses from a Radio Button Group to another Radio Button Group' width="1493" height="659">
7. Switch to the **Preview** tab to test the configuration.

    <img src="images/eud-radio-to-radio.png" alt='Preview carrying forward unselected responses from a Radio Button Group to another Radio Button Group' width="1030" height="771">

### Carry Forward Selected Responses from a Tag Box to a Ranking Question

1. Add a **Multi-Select Dropdown** question to the design surface.
2. Assign it a **Question name** (ID) and a user-friendly **Question title**.
3. Under **Choice Options**, populate the Tag Box with choices.
4. Optionally, specify the **Choice Options** > **Maximum choices to select** setting to limit the number of choices a respondent can select.

    <img src="images/eud-max-choices-to-select-tag-box.png" alt='How to set the maximum choices to select for a Tag Box' width="336" height="320">
5. Add a **Ranking** question to the design surface.
6. Under **General**, select the **Allow selective ranking** checkbox.
7. Under **Choice Options**, locate the **Copy choices from the following question** setting and select a source question ID (**Question name** value) from the drop-down list of available questions.
8. Locate the **Which choice options to copy** setting and click **Selected**.

    <img src="images/eud-ranking.png" alt='How to carry forward responses to a Ranking question and enable selective ranking' width="1491" height="700">
9. Set a required value in the **Maximum choices to select** input field.

    <img src="images/eud-max-ranking.png" alt='Limit the number of choices to select in a Ranking question with enabled selective ranking' width="330" height="380">
10. Switch to the **Preview** tab to test the configuration.

<img src="images/eud-tag-box-to-ranking.png" alt='Preview carrying forward selected responses from a Tag Box to a Ranking question' width="1016" height="633">