ArcGIS Survey123

Form-centric field data collection that writes straight into an ArcGIS organisation

As of 1 September 2026, ArcGIS Survey123's pricing is not published; the vendor quotes on request. Free to download and free to use if you already own ArcGIS, which is the catch: every person who fills in a secure survey needs a paid ArcGIS user type, so the real cost is licences, not the app. Softwr lists it under Maps. ArcGIS Survey123 is made by Esri, available on Web, iOS, Android, Windows.

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Overview

What ArcGIS Survey123 does

ArcGIS Survey123 is a form-based data collection tool. Surveys are authored in a browser designer or in XLSForm, a spreadsheet syntax shared with Open Data Kit, and completed in a mobile app or browser, online or offline. Submitted records land directly in an ArcGIS hosted feature layer, where they are immediately available to maps, dashboards, geoprocessing and Enterprise workflows without an export step. The fact that decides shortlists is the licensing, and Esri states it obliquely. Survey123 itself carries no separate charge. But it requires an ArcGIS Online or ArcGIS Enterprise organisation to host and secure the surveys, authoring requires a Creator or GIS Professional user type, and every person completing a secure survey needs a Mobile Worker, Editor, Creator or GIS Professional licence. Reference pricing on public marketplaces has shown Creator around $700 a year and Mobile Worker around $400. For a hundred field staff that is a materially different number from the free app it appears to be. Buyers are utilities, local government, environmental agencies, asset owners and anyone whose field data must land in an existing corporate GIS rather than in a separate survey platform. The trade-off is that Survey123 is excellent inside ArcGIS and pointless outside it. If your spatial estate is not Esri, you are paying an ArcGIS subscription for a form tool that free alternatives match.

What people use it for

A water utility recording hydrant inspections that must appear on the corporate asset map the moment they are submitted, not after a nightly import
A local authority running a public consultation where anyone can submit without a licence, while staff review responses in an ArcGIS dashboard
An environmental monitoring programme with complex conditional forms authored in XLSForm and completed offline in areas with no signal
A field crew already licensed for ArcGIS Field Maps that needs structured forms alongside map-based editing without adding another vendor

Where it falls short

Concrete and checkable, so you can decide whether any of them matter to you. This is the half of a review a vendor will not write about ArcGIS Survey123.

The app is free and the licensing is not: every person completing a secure survey needs a paid ArcGIS user type, so a hundred-person field programme costs tens of thousands a year before anyone counts credits.
Esri does not publish user type prices on its main pricing pages, so buyers reconstruct the cost from marketplace listings or a sales conversation, which makes budgeting an ArcGIS rollout unnecessarily opaque.
Credits are consumed by geocoding, storage and some analysis, and a data collection programme that generates heavy attachment volumes can burn through the bundled allowance and trigger a mid-year top-up.
It is useless without ArcGIS. There is no standalone deployment, so the decision to use Survey123 is really a decision to buy or keep an ArcGIS estate.
Form authoring splits between a web designer that is easy but limited and XLSForm plus Survey123 Connect that is capable but requires learning a spreadsheet syntax, and teams routinely start in the wrong one and rebuild.

Cross-shopped

What people choose instead of ArcGIS Survey123

Each pairing was judged by two reviewers asking whether a buyer would genuinely weigh the two against each other. The ones that failed were deleted rather than published.

ArcGIS Survey123vs
Fulcrum
Fulcrum: A standalone field data platform with published per-user pricing and no GIS estate required
ArcGIS Survey123vs
SW Maps
SW Maps: Free, if you only need to collect attributed spatial features on Android and can manage your own data
ArcGIS Survey123vs
Q
QGIS
QGIS: If the requirement is analysis of collected data rather than a licensed collection app

Pricing

What ArcGIS Survey123 costs

Taken from the vendor's own pricing page. Prices move, so check before you buy.

Survey123 app

Free

No separate charge for the app itself
Requires an ArcGIS Online or Enterprise organisation
Public surveys can be completed without a licence

Creator user type

On request

Required to author and publish surveys
Foundational user type, can administer the organisation
Includes an annual credit allowance
Public marketplace listings have shown around $700 per year

Mobile Worker user type

On request

Required for each person completing a secure survey
Dependent user type, must be added to an organisation with a foundational licence
Public marketplace listings have shown around $400 per year

Capabilities

Features

XLSForm authoring
Build complex forms with skip logic, validation and calculations in a spreadsheet
Web designer
Author simpler surveys in a browser without XLSForm syntax
Offline collection
Complete surveys without connectivity and sync when a connection returns
Direct ArcGIS write
Submissions land in a hosted feature layer usable immediately by maps and dashboards
Repeats and nested records
Capture one-to-many relationships such as multiple readings per asset
Media and signature capture
Attach photos, audio, sketches and signatures to a submission
Webhooks and integration
Trigger Power Automate, Integromat or custom workflows on submission
Reports
Generate formatted Word or PDF reports from submitted records
Survey123 Connect
Desktop authoring tool for advanced forms and custom JavaScript functions

Answered, with sources

Questions people ask

Each answer names the page it came from, so you can check it rather than take our word for it.

Is Survey123 free?

The app is. Using it is not, unless your surveys are public. Authoring needs a Creator licence and each person completing a secure survey needs a Mobile Worker, Editor, Creator or GIS Professional user type.

How much are the user types?

Esri does not list them on its main pricing pages. Public marketplace listings have shown roughly $700 a year for Creator and $400 for Mobile Worker; confirm with Esri or a distributor for your region.

Can respondents fill in a survey without a licence?

Yes, if the survey is shared publicly. Secure surveys require a licensed user type.

Does it work offline?

Yes, in the mobile app, with sync when connectivity returns.

Is it the same as ArcGIS Field Maps?

No. Field Maps is map-centric editing; Survey123 is form-centric. Many organisations license both, which doubles nothing because user types cover the whole app suite.

Keep looking

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Softwr does not host reviews and shows no star rating for ArcGIS Survey123, because a rating we did not collect is not ours to publish. What is here is the pricing and platform detail from the vendor’s own pages, limitations we could state concretely, and alternatives a reviewer confirmed people weigh against it. Tell us if any of it is wrong.

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