Forms and surveys are essential tools for businesses to collect information, gauge feedback, register attendees, and more. With the rise of online form builders, creating forms is easier than ever. Two popular options are Microsoft Forms and Typeform. But which one is right for your needs? This comprehensive comparison highlights the key features, pricing, use cases, and more to help you decide.
A Brief Overview of Microsoft Forms and Typeform
Microsoft Forms is a free online form-building and analysing tool included in Microsoft 365 subscriptions. It allows users to create surveys, quizzes, registrations, and more using a simple drag-and-drop interface. Forms live within the Microsoft ecosystem and integrate tightly with other Office apps.
Typeform offers an online form builder with sleek, conversational interfaces. It provides over 20 beautifully designed form templates to choose from. Typeform is known for creating engaging, interactive forms with a modern look and feel. It offers seamless mobile responsiveness, flexible logic features, and built-in analytics.
Now let's dive deeper into how these two form builders compare across key factors:
Comparing the Question and Field Types
Both Microsoft Forms and Typeform offer an array of question and field types to add to forms including:
Typeform includes a few additional options like sliders, toggles, adjective wheels, and mini-quizzes. Overall, Typeform provides more versatility in customising the question types and layouts.
Logic and Branching
Logic features allow you to control the flow and order of questions based on previous responses. Both tools support basic logic and branching, but Typeform includes more advanced options:
Microsoft Forms has more basic logic settings for branching and required fields.
Form Customization and Branding
Typeform clearly dominates when it comes to customisation and branding forms. It offers templates, colors, fonts, backgrounds, and more for building on-brand forms.
Microsoft Forms has basic customisation like adding a logo, colors, and backgrounds. But the options are limited compared to Typeform.
Accessibility
Microsoft Forms provides stellar accessibility with built-in features like screen reader support, keyboard navigation, and alt text options.
Typeform offers accessibility features but not quite to the level of Microsoft Forms. Typeform also lacks advanced support for screen readers.
Pricing and Plans Comparison
Both tools offer free versions along with paid plans that unlock additional features.
Free Plans
Microsoft Forms is included free with many Microsoft 365 plans. Typeform's free plan includes unlimited forms and 50 responses per month.
Paid Plans
Microsoft Forms pricing is bundled with Microsoft 365 plans starting at $6/month per user. Typeform's paid plans start at £21/month for the Basic plan which includes unlimited forms, responses, and advanced features.
Typeform offers more flexibility with three paid tiers while Microsoft Forms has just one plan tied to M365.
Features by Tier
Typeform's higher-level plans add features like:
- Reminder emails
- Form scheduling
- Additional integration options
- More customisation abilities
- Advanced analytics and reporting
Microsoft Forms adds negligible features in the paid tiers beyond what's in the free version.
Comparing Use Cases and Applications
Both tools work well for:
- Surveys and feedback collection
- Quizzes and tests
- Event registrations
- Job applications
Typeform's beautiful, conversational style makes it ideal for client-facing forms like registrations, lead gen surveys, and polls. Microsoft Forms is better suited for internal uses like employee surveys, trainings, and office forms.
Reviewing Integrations and Connections
Microsoft Forms naturally integrates seamlessly with Office apps like Outlook, Teams, and Excel. You can embed forms into SharePoint and capture responses in Excel.
Typeform connects with over 1000+ apps via Zapier including email, analytics, payments, and more. It also offers gated video integrations and webhooks.
Both provide APIs for building custom integrations as well.
Comparing Analytics and Reporting
Microsoft Forms provides built-in analytics like response summaries, charts, and basic metrics. But advanced reporting requires exporting to Excel. You can use Power Automate to send the Excel responses into Power BI, if needed.
Typeform shines bright with its in-depth analytics on completion rates, engagement, drop-off points, customisable reports, and more. You can also easily hook your form up to 100s of integrations with ease.
Collaboration and Sharing Functions
Microsoft Forms allows form owners to add collaborators and set permissions. Links make it easy to share forms for collecting responses. You can also choose to share your form with people only in your organisation (with a Microsoft 365 account), or externally.
Typeform enables real-time form response streaming to instantly view results. Users can publish gorgeous landing pages and share forms on social media with custom URLs.
Which Online Form Builder is Right for You?
When weighing the pros and cons of Microsoft Forms versus Typeform, some key differences emerge. Both platforms have their relative strengths and weaknesses that are important to evaluate based on your specific use case and needs. At a high level, Microsoft Forms tends to excel in ease of use and integration with Microsoft environments, while Typeform offers superior customisation and analytics capabilities. The pros and cons when comparing these two form builders are:
Microsoft Forms
Microsoft Forms is best suited for simple internal forms where Microsoft integration and ease of use are the top priorities.
Pros
Cons
Typeform
Typeform is ideal for customisable, professional-grade external facing forms where advanced analytics are needed.
Pros
Cons
10 Real World Use Cases: Microsoft Forms or Typeform?
Determining which platform suits different real world uses can be tricky. Here are 10 examples with recommendations:
1. Employee Satisfaction Survey - A yearly survey to gauge employee morale, feedback, and satisfaction. Recommendation: Microsoft Forms for easy distribution to company email accounts.
2. Conference Registration Form - Collect attendee details for an external industry conference. Recommendation: Typeform for a polished, on-brand experience.
3. Quiz to Generate Leads - Fun online quiz published on your website to capture visitor data. Recommendation: Typeform for built-in lead capture integrations.
4. Customer Feedback Survey - Understand customer pain points and satisfaction. Recommendation: Typeform for detailed analytics and reporting.
5. New Employee Onboarding - Collect info from new hires like emergency contacts. Recommendation: Microsoft Forms for easy integration into existing HR systems.
6. Event Invitation RSVP - Allow attendees to RSVP for an upcoming event. Recommendation: Typeform to create a stylized, engaging RSVP form.
7. Training Course Quiz - Evaluate knowledge after internal training program. Recommendation: Microsoft Forms for simple quiz creation and grading.
8. Job Application - Allow candidates to apply for openings online. Recommendation: Typeform to make a memorable, branded application.
9. Weekly Polls - Fun, informal polls to engage your audience on social media. Recommendation: Typeform for beautiful poll displays.
10. Research Study Screening - Screen participants for eligibility in a study. Recommendation: Typeform for advanced logic to handle multiple conditional paths.
Verdict: Evaluate your specific use case, but for external or customer-facing forms, Typeform is typically the best fit.
The Verdict
While both platforms make form building accessible, Typeform is the best choice for business use cases that demand high-quality, customized forms with robust reporting. The conversational interfaces and top-notch analytics provide immense value.
Microsoft Forms is ideal for basic internal forms where Office integration is key. For externally-facing forms to engage customers and users, Typeform's unique interactive builder and analytics win out.
The best platform depends on your specific needs and budget. Evaluate the key differences in features, use cases, and pricing to determine if Microsoft Forms or Typeform is a better fit. But for serious business forms that need maximum customisation and insights, Typeform takes the prize.