Open-ended vs close-ended questions: Best practices, tips, & examples

Open-ended questions collect written, qualitative feedback in respondents’ own words, while closed-ended questions capture structured, quantitative data through predefined answer choices. Understanding how these formats differ and knowing when to use each one helps you design surveys that uncover motivations, reveal patterns, and make your results easier to interpret.

This guide explains the difference between open-ended and closed-ended questions with clear definitions, examples, and guidance on when each format works best. You will learn how combining both approaches leads to stronger insights and more confident decision-making.

Open-ended questions collect qualitative detail in respondents’ own words, while closed-ended questions produce structured, quantifiable data. Each format plays a different role in survey design, and using them together helps you understand both what people think and why they think it.

Knowing when to use each helps you design surveys that balance depth and efficiency, which ultimately leads to clearer insights and stronger decisions.

Open-ended or closed-ended? How about both:

An open-ended question is a survey question that invites respondents to answer in their own words, providing qualitative detail instead of selecting from predefined choices. These questions help you understand context, motivations, and lived experiences that numeric data alone cannot capture. They reveal the thinking behind a response, making your results more meaningful and actionable.

Open-ended questions take many forms, depending on the kind of insight you want to surface.

Respondents answer open-ended questions by typing into a text field, using as much or as little detail as they choose. These responses generate qualitative data that you can review manually or analyze using features like SurveyMonkey text analysis, rule-based tagging, or sentiment analysis. These features help you identify themes, emotions, and important patterns across large volumes of written feedback.

Here are several examples across common survey use cases:

Open-ended questions work best when you need a deeper understanding rather than a quick measurement. Use them when you want to capture experiences, motivations, expectations, or frustrations in respondents’ own words.

They also work well as optional follow-up questions after a closed-ended item, since this gives people a chance to explain their rating without slowing down the rest of the survey.

If you expect many respondents to take your survey on mobile, keep open-text items brief and strategically place them to support your data goals without causing fatigue.

A closed-ended question is a survey question that asks respondents to choose from predefined answer options, producing structured and quantifiable data. This format helps you measure trends, compare groups, and analyze results quickly because each response fits into a clear set of categories.

Close-ended questions come in many formats, each supporting different research needs.

Close-ended questions rely on structured response options that make it easy for respondents to choose an answer and easy for you to analyze results. Because every answer maps to a specific category or number, these questions support statistical analysis, benchmarking, and trend tracking.

Closed-ended questions are especially useful when conducting quantitative research. For example, the Net Promoter Score (NPS®) survey, an industry-standard metric for measuring customer loyalty, uses a single closed-ended rating question (0–10) as the foundation of the entire survey.

Below are examples across common survey types:

Close-ended questions are the right choice when you need structured data that is easy to quantify and compare. They work well when measuring satisfaction, awareness, preferences, or behavior across many respondents. Use them to track changes over time, benchmark results, or filter responses into clear groups. They are also ideal early in a survey when you want to keep respondents moving with simple, predictable choices.

Strong survey questions help you collect feedback that is easy to interpret and meaningful to act on. These seven practices give you a simple framework for designing questions that work well across both formats, whether you are gathering quick metrics or looking for deeper insights.

Before writing any questions, define what you want to learn and how you expect to use the results. A clear goal makes it easier to decide which topics to explore, how detailed your questions should be, and where open-ended or closed-ended formats will work best.

Use closed-ended questions to consistently measure attitudes, preferences, or behavior. Add open-ended questions when you want to understand the motivations behind a response or explore an idea in more detail. Blending both formats gives you strong quantitative data along with the context needed to interpret it.

Clarity drives better responses. Keep questions simple, specific, and free of assumptions or bias. Avoid leading phrasing by checking your wording against resources like our guide to good survey questions and tips on avoiding loaded questions. Make sure each question addresses only one idea so your data stays clean and easy to analyze.

When using closed-ended formats, choose answer scales that provide respondents with enough options to answer accurately. Simple agree/disagree questions may not capture nuance, while overly large rating scales can create noise rather than insight. Select the smallest scale that still supports clarity and useful comparisons.

5. Use open-text questions strategically to reduce fatigue and capture context

Open-ended questions are helpful when respondents need space to explain a rating or describe an experience. Use them thoughtfully and limit the number required so the survey stays easy to complete, especially on mobile devices. Optional open-text follow-ups are an effective way to collect context without slowing everyone down.

Six out of ten surveys are taken via mobile, according to our research. Your survey should be phone-friendly to ensure high response rates. Review your survey on a mobile screen to confirm that questions are readable, open-text boxes are manageable, and answer choices do not feel crowded.

If you need a head start, explore a SurveyMonkey survey template or browse 1000s of pre-written ideas in the Question Bank. After responses start coming in, features like rule-based tagging for sorting open-ended answers and built-in sentiment analysis make it easier to interpret both qualitative and quantitative feedback.

Designing strong open- and close-ended questions is easier with the right support. SurveyMonkey gives you intuitive tools to create thoughtful questions, refine your survey flow, and analyze both qualitative and quantitative feedback with confidence.

You can start with a customizable survey template or explore thousands of expert-written ideas in the Question Bank. AI-assisted features help you draft and improve questions, while text analysis, rule-based tagging, and real-time reporting make it simple to interpret written responses alongside structured data.

Whether you are running a quick pulse check or collecting in-depth insights, SurveyMonkey helps you build surveys that are clear, effective, and ready to act on. Get started for free.

NPS, Net Promoter & Net Promoter Score are registered trademarks of Satmetrix Systems, Inc., Bain & Company and Fred Reichheld.

NPS, Net Promoter & Net Promoter Score are registered trademarks of Satmetrix Systems, Inc., Bain & Company and Fred Reichheld.