Comparison · Forms & surveys
InviziPoll vs Microsoft Forms
Microsoft Forms is free with Microsoft 365 and already on everyone's laptop, so it's where most teams start. The catch is trust: on a work form, one checkbox decides whether answers carry names, every response is timed, and your team can't check either. InviziPoll is for the surveys where that doubt costs you honest answers.
Just checking whether Microsoft Forms is anonymous? Read the short answer
Use Microsoft Forms for sign-ups, quick checks and anything nobody would mind their name on. Use InviziPoll when you're asking something people won't answer honestly unless they're sure it can't come back to them.
- Forms can be anonymous, but it's one checkbox the owner controls, and your team has to take your word for it.
- Forms records start and completion times on every response, even anonymous ones. InviziPoll records no time at all.
- Forms costs nothing extra. InviziPoll is $49 a month per workspace, so it's worth it when honesty on sensitive questions is the point.
Two products, two buyers
The overlap is real, but the default assumptions are different. Start here before scanning the feature table.
Best for
InviziPoll
HR leads, managers and founders asking questions people don't answer honestly by default: how safe it feels to raise a problem, trust in leadership, a reorg, why people leave. It fits when the team is small enough that a name, a time or a turn of phrase would give someone away.
Best for
Microsoft Forms
Microsoft 365 teams collecting sign-ups, event feedback, quizzes and low-stakes internal forms, where convenience matters most and nobody minds being identified.
Side-by-side, dimension by dimension
Competitor facts checked 2026-09-30 against 4 linked sources.
InviziPollBest for Default attributionAnswers are encrypted on each person's own device before they're sent. We store no name, email, IP address or time next to an answer, so there's no link to find, for us, for you, or for anyone who gets into either.
On forms limited to your organization, Record name attaches each respondent's name and email. The owner decides per form, and respondents can't check.
Responses carry no time at all, and written answers are shuffled, so there's nothing to line up against who left a meeting when.
Each response carries start and completion times in the Excel export, including on anonymous forms.
Nothing shows until the poll's minimum group size has answered, a number you choose that's never below three. While it's open, the first results appear three answers past that number, then new answers arrive in random groups of three to five. A few answers are always held in reserve until the poll closes, so no one's answer can be picked out.
Results show from the first response. Microsoft's guidance warns that content or timing can still identify someone in a small group.
Send personal one-use links or access codes to limit who can answer. Neither is stored with the answer, so controlling access never puts a name on a response.
Org-only forms use sign-in, which is also what makes Record name and one response per person possible.
You see every chart and read written answers word for word, shuffled and undated. Anyone who'd rather not be read can send just the topics they pick instead. You can't see who answered, who didn't, or in what order.
Each response on its own, with the respondent's name if it was recorded, plus summary charts.
Breakdowns by department, location or tenure, from your contact list or a demographic question, appear once the poll closes, for groups of five or more (or your minimum group size, if that's higher). One that could be worked out by subtraction is left out.
Filter or slice the Excel export however you like, down to one person.
$49 a month per workspace on Pro, not per employee, with 14 days free and no credit card.
Included in most Microsoft 365 business plans at no extra cost.
Microsoft Forms capabilities vary by plan and configuration. Confirm specifics against their current documentation.
Is Microsoft Forms anonymous?
It can be, but not by default on work accounts. On a form limited to your organization, Record name attaches each respondent's name and email unless the owner clears it, and Microsoft's own guidance warns that answers or their timing can still identify someone in a small group. Every response also carries start and completion times in the Excel export, anonymous or not. So it's anonymous if the owner set it up that way, and your team is trusting that they did.
Which one should you pick?
If both tools could technically run your poll, let the default assumption decide.
Choose InviziPoll when
- The question is sensitive and a Record name checkbox isn't a promise your team will believe.
- Your team is small enough that a response time or a writing style would give someone away.
- You want to show people how they're protected, not ask them to trust a setting.
Keep Microsoft Forms when
- It's a sign-up, a quiz or a quick check nobody would mind their name on.
- Everything has to stay inside Microsoft 365 and there's no budget for another tool.
- You need to know who answered, for follow-up or attendance.
How each vendor thinks about cost
InviziPoll
Pro is $49 a month per workspace: send each poll to up to 2,000 people, with five admins. Business is $249 a month ($199 billed annually) and adds SSO, SCIM provisioning and SIEM webhooks. You pay per workspace, not per employee. Every new workspace gets 14 days free with no credit card, and Enterprise is quoted.
See plansMICROSOFT FORMS
Included with Microsoft 365 Business Basic, Standard and Premium, and the E and A plans, with no separate charge. A free version comes with personal Microsoft accounts.
Switching
Bring your questions across
Microsoft Forms has no question export, so there's no file to hand over. Open your form, copy the whole page and paste it in: InviziPoll pulls out the questions and options and turns them into a draft poll you can edit before you publish. On a plan without AI, paste one question per line or a CSV instead.
Only question definitions come across. Responses and results are never imported, from any tool, because respondent answers are encrypted in the browser and we have no way to read them back in. How importing works
In Forms, anonymity is a setting the form's owner controls and respondents can't check, and every response is timed. In InviziPoll there's nothing to switch: answers are encrypted on each person's device, no name or time is stored with them, and results only show once enough people have answered. The difference your team notices is that they can believe it. For the full answer on Forms itself, see /blog/is-microsoft-forms-anonymous.
Copy the questions from your Microsoft Forms survey and paste them in. On plans with AI authoring, InviziPoll turns the pasted text into a draft poll, questions and options included, and shows you everything it found before anything's saved. Without AI, paste one question per line. Only questions come across: past responses stay where they are, because we can't import answers we'd be able to read. See /docs/docs-importing-questions-from-another-tool.
Send them /trust/anonymity, which says in plain language what we can and can't see, and link it from the invitation. When results are ready you can publish them as a signed summary anyone can check hasn't been edited. And before you send anything, open the sample poll in a new workspace: it takes about two minutes and shows you exactly what an admin sees, which is the same thing you'd be promising your team.
Whenever the answers aren't sensitive. Sign-ups, event feedback, quizzes and quick checks are what Forms is good at, and it costs nothing extra. InviziPoll is for the handful of questions a year where people hold back unless they're sure nobody can trace them.
Forms comes with Microsoft 365. InviziPoll Pro is $49 a month per workspace, for polls of up to 2,000 people, and Business is $249 a month ($199 billed annually) with SSO. It's per workspace, not per employee, and every workspace starts with 14 days free and no credit card. See /pricing.
Sources
Last verified 2026-09-30
- Microsoft Forms: set up your survey so names aren't recordedsupport.microsoft.com ↗
- Microsoft Forms: choose who can fill out a formsupport.microsoft.com ↗
- Microsoft Forms: check and share your results (export columns)support.microsoft.com ↗
- Microsoft Forms service description (plans that include Forms)learn.microsoft.com ↗
Test the anonymity model yourself
Spin up a workspace and run an anonymous poll against your own threat model: ciphertext-only, no sales call required.