You can close your survey at any time to stop accepting new responses. This is useful when you've reached your target sample size or need to begin analyzing your data without new submissions affecting your results.

Closing your survey

To stop accepting responses:

1. Navigate to your survey's settings page
2. Change the survey status from "Open" to "Closed"
3. Save your changes

Once closed, your survey will no longer accept:

• New web form submissions
• Paper survey uploads

What happens when someone tries to access a closed survey?

When visitors attempt to access a closed survey, they'll see a standard message indicating the survey is no longer accepting responses. Currently, PaperSurvey doesn't offer built-in custom closure messages, but there's an effective workaround.

Creating a custom closure message

If you need to display a specific message to visitors when survey is closed, you can set up a redirect:

1. Create new survey

   • Create a new survey in your account
   • Add a "Description" question type
   • Write your closure message (e.g., "Thank you for your interest. This survey closed on [date]. For questions, contact [email].")

2. Save your original survey link

   • Go to your original survey's settings
   • Copy the current "Survey Link" value
   • Replace it with a random text

3. Set up the redirect

   • Enable web surveys on your new survey
   • Paste your original survey link into the new survey's "Survey Link" field
   • Save the changes

Now when someone visits your original survey URL, they'll see your custom closure message instead as a different survey will be opened.

Best practices

• Close your survey as soon as you reach your target responses to maintain data integrity
• Consider downloading a backup of your data before closing
• If you need to reopen the survey later, simply change the status back to "Open"
• For time-sensitive studies, mention the closing date in your survey invitation

Next steps

After closing your survey:

• Export your data for analysis
• Review response quality and completion rates
• Archive your survey for future reference

Need to analyze responses from a closed survey? Check our data export guides for detailed instructions.