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SurveyReflex

Survey Builder Overview

The Survey Builder is where you create and customize your surveys. It is a what-you-see-is-what-you-get (WYSIWYG) editor — your survey looks the same while you build it as it will for respondents.

Accessing the Builder

Open the survey builder by:

  1. Creating a new survey (you’ll be taken there automatically)
  2. Clicking “Edit” on any existing survey from your dashboard
  3. Clicking the “Builder” tab in the survey navigation

The Builder Header

Everything you need to move through the survey lifecycle lives in the header:

  • Survey title — click the title to rename your survey inline. No separate settings form needed.
  • Status chip — shows whether the survey is a draft or published.
  • Section tabs — switch between Build, Logic, Design, and Settings.
  • Save indicator — shows when your work was last saved.
  • Preview — opens a full preview of the survey.
  • Publish — takes you to the publish flow when your survey is ready. On published surveys this becomes a Save button, and a Share button appears next to the tabs.

The Four Builder Tabs

TabPurpose
BuildWrite your questions, welcome screen, and thank-you screen
LogicCreate branching paths with a visual flow map
DesignChoose a display style and design, fine-tune colors and fonts, add your logo
SettingsControl access, response options, workspace, and scheduling

The Build Tab

The Build tab is divided into three areas:

Left — Content List

An outline of your survey:

  • Welcome screen, every question, and Thank-you screen
  • Click any item to jump to it on the canvas
  • Drag questions to reorder them
  • Click “Add question” to open the question type picker

Center — Canvas

Your survey, rendered as editable cards:

  • Click question text, answer options, or placeholders and type directly on the card
  • The welcome and thank-you cards work the same way — click to edit the welcome message, description, and thank-you message
  • Matrix questions are edited right on the grid: add or remove rows and columns inline
  • Hover over a card for quick Duplicate and Delete actions

Cards also show at-a-glance chips when a question is required, has branching rules, is shown/hidden by logic, or has an AI follow-up enabled.

Right — Settings Rail

Contextual settings for whatever is selected:

  • Question type (with the option to change it)
  • Required toggle
  • Type-specific options (rating scale range, matrix scale style, text validation, and so on)
  • AI follow-up toggle for eligible question types

Building on a Phone or Tablet

The builder works on small screens — you can create and edit a full survey from a phone.

The layout adapts rather than shrinking:

  • The header splits into two rows, with the section tabs on their own horizontally scrollable row so Preview and Publish always stay reachable.
  • The canvas takes the full width, and a compact bar sits at the bottom of the screen with Outline, Settings, and Add question.
  • Outline opens the survey outline as a sheet — tap any item to jump to it, and the sheet closes so you can edit the card.
  • Settings opens the same contextual settings you’d see in the right rail on desktop: question type, Required, and type-specific options.
  • On the Logic tab, tap a question node or a branch line on the flow map to open its rule editor as a sheet.

On tablets the outline returns as a column, and on desktop both side columns are always visible.

For heavy work — reordering many questions or mapping complex branching — a larger screen is still easier.

Saving

  • Drafts save automatically — about two seconds after you stop typing. The save indicator in the header confirms it.
  • Published surveys save explicitly — use the Save button in the header so live respondents never see half-finished edits.

Editing a Published Survey

Once a survey is published, its structure is locked to protect the responses you’ve already collected:

  • You can edit question wording, options text, messages, design, and logic
  • You cannot add, remove, or change the type of questions that were live at publish time

Locked cards show a note explaining this on the canvas.

What’s Next?

Learn more about specific builder features: