Web Forms lets you build a form in ActiveMerge, share a link to it, and collect answers. Each response is saved in your account, turned into a PDF, and can be emailed to you, emailed back to the person who filled it in, and sent to your own systems by webhook. A form can also fill one of your templates with every response. That has its own guide: Generate a document from each form response.
Create a form
Go to Web Forms in the sidebar and click New form. Give it a name (only you see this) and click Create. The form opens in the Build tab with two starter questions, Full name and Email.
If you already have a template with placeholders, use New form from a template instead. ActiveMerge adds a question for each placeholder and links the template for you. See Generate a document from each form response.
Add and arrange questions
The Build tab has three columns: the question types on the left, your form in the middle, and the settings for the selected question on the right.
Add a question by clicking a type on the left, or dragging it onto a page. You can use:
| Type | Use it for |
|---|---|
| Short text | Names, short answers |
| Long text | Comments, addresses |
| An email address (checked for a valid format) | |
| Phone | A phone number |
| Number | Amounts, quantities. You can set a minimum, a maximum, or whole numbers only |
| Date | A date. You can set the earliest and latest date allowed |
| Dropdown, Multiple choice | One answer from a list |
| Checkboxes | Several answers from a list. You can set how many must be picked |
| Consent checkbox | “I agree to the terms” and similar |
| Signature | The respondent draws their signature with a mouse or finger |
| Heading / text | A heading with formatted text, to split a long form into sections. It collects no answer |
Edit a question by clicking it. On the right you can change the question text, add help text, mark it Required, add answer options, and set limits such as a minimum length.
Reorder by dragging a question by its handle (⋮⋮), or with the ↑ and ↓ buttons. Duplicate (⧉) and delete (✕) are on each question too.
Headings have a small text editor: bold, italic, underline, links, numbered and bulleted lists, and quotes. The formatting shows on the form exactly as you set it.
Pages
Click + Add page below the form to split it into steps. Respondents see “Step 1 of 3” and use Next and Back buttons. You can give each page a title, and reorder or delete pages with the buttons on the page header.
Show a question only when it applies
Any question can be shown only when earlier answers match. Select the question, then under Show this field choose When all of these match or When any of these match, and add conditions such as “Department is Sales” or “Budget is greater than 5000”. A condition can only use questions above it.
Hidden questions aren’t required, even if they’re marked Required, and their answers aren’t saved.
The respondent’s email and name
To email respondents a copy of their answers or their document, ActiveMerge needs to know which question holds their email address. Select your Email question and set Use this answer as to Respondent’s email. Likewise, mark a Short text question as Respondent’s name: it identifies each response in your Responses list and names the documents a form generates.
Save, preview and publish
Your changes save automatically as you work. The status next to the buttons shows “All changes saved”.
- Preview opens the form as respondents will see it, using your latest changes. Submitting is turned off in preview.
- Publish makes the form live. After that, Copy link gives you the address to share.
- Changes you make to a live form don’t affect respondents until you click Publish changes. Until then they keep seeing the previous version.
- Pause stops the form accepting responses without deleting anything, and Resume turns it back on. People who open a paused form see your “closed” message.
Every response is stored with the version of the form it was submitted on, so later edits never change the labels or options of older responses.
Settings
The Settings tab controls everything around the questions.
Form page
- Title respondents see and an Introduction shown above the questions.
Branding
- A logo, an accent colour and a page background. See Brand your forms.
After submitting
- A thank-you heading and message, or a page on your own site to send people to instead (it must start with
https://). - Let respondents download a PDF copy of their response from the thank-you page.
- The message when the form is closed (paused, or out of monthly responses).
Document
- Fill one of your templates with every response. See Generate a document from each form response.
Notifications
- Email me each new response, with a PDF of the answers attached. By default it goes to the form owner. Add up to 10 addresses in Send to to change that.
- Email respondents a copy of their answers. This needs a question marked as Respondent’s email.
Spam protection
- Ask respondents to confirm they’re human adds a Cloudflare Turnstile check. We recommend leaving it on: spam responses count toward your monthly allowance.
Webhook
- Send each response to a URL as JSON, for example to Zapier, Make or your own server. Each request is signed. The
X-ActiveMerge-Signatureheader issha256=followed by an HMAC of the timestamp, a dot, and the request body, using the signing secret shown in Settings. The timestamp is inX-ActiveMerge-Timestamp. If the form generates a document, the webhook includes its name and a download link that works for 24 hours.
Responses
The Responses tab lists every response, newest first. You can:
- Search answers, filter by status, and pick a date range.
- Export CSV of the responses you’re viewing, one column per question.
- Open a response to see every answer, the signature, and What happened after it was submitted: the PDF, each email, the document and the webhook, each marked Done or Failed with the reason.
- Download PDF of the answers, and Download document if the form generates one.
- Retry failed steps if something failed, for example an email that bounced or a webhook that was down. Steps that already worked aren’t repeated.
- Mark as spam, which stops any further emails or webhooks for it, or Delete response for good.
Monthly responses
Responses don’t use credits. Each plan includes a number of responses per billing month, shared by all of your forms (and your team’s):
| Plan | Responses per month |
|---|---|
| Free | 10 |
| Pro | 1,000 |
| Plus | 2,000 |
| Business | 4,000 |
| Ultra | 6,000 |
The Web Forms page shows how many you’ve used and when the count resets. We email you at 80% and when you reach the limit. At the limit, your forms show their closed message until the month resets or you upgrade.
Generating a document from a response does use credits, like any other generated document.