Exporting submissions

You can export submissions as a CSV file or Excel file and then work on these submissions in other applications. If you only want to export some of your submissions, you can use criteria to filter your submissions before exporting them. To find out more about using filters, see our article on Filtering submissions.

Exporting submissions as a CSV file

You can export your submissions as a CSV file, which is a simplified, text file format. Instead of information being saved in columns like in Excel, this format stores the data separated by commas. CSV files are useful when sharing larger amounts of data and offer almost universal compatibility, as they can be imported into most text processing and database applications.

Form elements that were present in previous versions of your form but have since been removed are also included in the export.

To export submissions as a CSV file, proceed as follows:

Click Forms at the top of the screen.
Locate the form whose submissions you want to export.
In the Submissions column, click the submissions number.
This takes you to the submissions page for the selected form.
In the Submissions overview, click Export at the top right.
A dialog field appears.
If filters have been set for the submissions, then the next step is to specify whether you want to export all of the submissions or only the filtered submissions.
Following this, select CSV as the format and then click Export.
Save the file as a CSV file on your computer. The form ID is used as the default name for the CSV file.

You have now exported the data records from your submissions.

The header row of the CSV file is structured as follows:

Form ID: Automatically assigned identifier.
Version: Indication of the form version.
Received: Timestamp of the submission.
Current form elements: Labels displayed to users in the form.
Removed form elements: Labels removed from the form.
Status: Current state of the submission.
User Agent: Information about the user's agent.
Language: User's language setting.
HTTP referrer: Source of the submission.
Email confirmation: indicates whether the double opt-in procedure was activated for the form submission.

The form ID is set automatically. The version number shows you which version of the form has been exported, while ‘Received’ tells you when the submission was made.

These fields are followed by the current and removed form fields. The labels listed here are the labels that are displayed to users in your form. The order in which these labels are listed in the export matches their order in the form itself. The form fields are followed by the form metadata.

The second line in the CSV file lists the technical names of the individual form fields, as these were assigned during the form field creation process. The key names for metadata are listed in accordance with the user’s language setting.

The submission data is included below the second line. The form ID shows you where a new submission starts.

Exporting submissions as an Excel file

If you have created a survey, for example, and want to present the survey response distribution visually, perhaps as a pie chart, then an Excel file export is a good choice.
Unlike CSV files, an Excel file export will export only the current form fields. Form fields in earlier versions that have since been removed will not be included in the export. A new worksheet is created for each version of the form.

One advantage of exporting submissions in the Excel format is that file attachments which users uploaded to the form are linked to the export and you can then open these attachments from within Excel itself.

To export submissions as an Excel file, proceed as follows:

Click Forms on the top menu bar.
Locate the form whose submissions you want to export.
In the Submissions column, click the submissions number.
This takes you to the submissions page for the selected form.
In the Submissions overview, click Export at the top right.
A dialog field appears.
If filters have been set for the submissions, then the next step is to specify whether you want to export all of the submissions or only the filtered submissions.
Following this, select Excel as the format and then click Export.
Save the file as an Excel file on your computer. The form ID is used as the default name for the Excel file.

You have now exported the data records from your submissions.

The header row of the Excel file is structured as follows:

Form ID: Automatically assigned identifier.
Version: Indication of the form version.
Received: Timestamp of the submission.
Form elements: Labels displayed to users in the form.
Status: Current state of the submission.
User Agent: Information about the user's agent.
Language: User's language setting.
HTTP referrer: Source of the submission.
Email confirmation: indicates whether the double opt-in procedure was activated for the form submission.

The form ID is set automatically. The version number shows you which version of the form has been exported, while ‘Received’ tells you when the submission was made. This is followed by the form elements. The labels listed here are the labels that are displayed to users in your form. The order in which these labels are listed in the export matches their order in the form itself. The form elements are followed by the form metadata.

The second row in the Excel file lists the technical names of the individual form fields, as these were assigned during the form element creation process. The key names for metadata are listed in accordance with the user’s language setting.

The submission data is included below the second row. One row is used for each submission.