On occasion you will need to delete all responses for your surveys. For example, you may have tested the survey or page logic using a live link, or you need to make major changes to the survey questions or other settings in your survey. SurveyMethods provides several options for deleting these responses:
- From the My Surveys page
- When attempting to edit a survey with responses
- From the Manage Surveys menu
Delete All Responses from the My Surveys Page
You can delete all responses from the My Surveys page by clicking the ‘Clear’ Icon (
You will then be prompted to confirm by entering YES in the box on the confirmation page.
Delete All Responses when Attempting to Edit a Survey With Responses
If you need to make major changes to a survey that already has responses, you will need to delete all of the responses in your survey in order to do so. Clicking on the Design icon (
Major edits include the following, among others:
- Add or delete questions
- Add or delete pages
- Deleting answer choices
To delete all responses and make these or other edits, select “Close Survey, DELETE RESPONSES, and Make Major Edits” and click Submit. You will be prompted to confirm that you want to delete all responses.
Typing YES in the box and clicking Submit will delete responses and take you to the survey design menu.
If you want to make major changes to a survey WITHOUT deleting existing data, you will need to copy the survey and make changes to the copy. The survey will be copied over and the response data will remain with the original survey. You can make changes to the copy and then launch that survey to gather responses in the new version.
Delete All Responses from the Manage Survey Menu
You also have an option to delete all responses in the Manage Survey menu, which can be accessed by clicking the Manage icon (
On the bottom left you will see options to Delete All Partial Responses or Delete All Responses.
Similar to the other methods, you will need to confirm on the next page before responses are deleted.
