PHP survey software in development since 2006
LimeSurvey is online survey software written in PHP, developed since 2006 and backed by LimeSurvey GmbH in Hamburg. You build questionnaires from more than 30 question types, with display conditions and calculations, in any of 80+ languages. A survey goes out through a public link or a QR code, or stays closed to a participant list invited by email. The Community Edition runs on your own server, and the company also sells a hosted version, LimeSurvey Cloud.
Formbricks is aimed at surveys triggered inside an app or on a website, OpnForm at web forms put together without code. Both are AGPL-3.0, with an "enterprise" code directory under a separate license.
The comparison of open source form and survey tools covers where each one stores responses and what it keeps for its paid plans.
Invite-only panels and exports to R, SPSS and Stata
- Logic written as expressions: in ExpressionScript, a question only shows when its relevance equation is true, text can change with earlier answers, and the Equation question type saves a computed value to the database even when hidden.
- Closed panels: the participant table gives each person a unique access code, sends invitations and reminders, and imports from a CSV file or an LDAP query.
- Statistical exports: plugins shipped with the code export responses to R, SPSS (
.sav) and Stata. - RemoteControl API: over XML-RPC or JSON-RPC, it creates surveys and pulls responses from another system.
- Locked-down admin: LDAP login, two-factor authentication for administrators and an audit log are all plugins in the repository.
- A new editor: previously limited to LimeSurvey Cloud, it became the Community Edition's default editor with version 7.
Paid one-click updates and no official Docker image
GPL-2.0 or later, with nothing carved out. The code is licensed under GPL version 2 "or any later version", apart from third-party components (LGPL, PHP License), and the license sets no directory aside under other terms. GPL obligations kick in on distribution, so running a modified version as an online service doesn't require publishing its code. The AGPL used by Formbricks and OpnForm would.
Hosting is billed by response volume. The free LimeSurvey Cloud plan stops at 25 responses a month; once the quota is used up, the survey stays locked until the next month. Basic is €34 a month for 1,000 responses a month, Expert €348 a year for 10,000 responses a year, Business €900 a year for 50,000, with 20% VAT included. Responses stay in the country you pick, in Europe, North America or Australia, and LimeSurvey offers other countries on request. SSO, LDAP and SAML only appear on the Corporate plan, priced on request. The Community Edition ships an LDAP plugin; SAML, which the README lists among its integrations, has no plugin in the repository.
One-click updates cost money. ComfortUpdate updates the Community Edition from the admin interface, but needs a key: a one-month trial, then €59 for six months (30 updates) or €99 for twelve (60), with access to older versions. Without a key, you update by hand following the manual.
No official Docker image. You need PHP 8.1.29 or later with mbstring and PDO, Apache or nginx, and MySQL 8, MariaDB 10.3.38, PostgreSQL 14 or SQL Server 2019. The manual asks for 250 MB of disk, gives no memory figure and doesn't mention Docker. The company publishes no image; martialblog/docker-limesurvey, a community image, already tracks 7.4.0.
Version 6 is out of support, and version 7 renames the response tables. Version 7.0.0 shipped on May 26, 2026; the roadmap gives it fixes until May 2028, then security fixes only until May 2029. Community Edition support for version 6 ended on August 31, 2026. Plugins, themes and reporting queries that read response tables or fields directly need testing before the upgrade. The roadmap plans a patch release every Monday: GitHub has 57 tagged versions from 2026, pre-releases included, and the download page offers 7.5.0.