Every field type, and when to use it

Every field the editor can add sits in the palette down the left of the Fields tab. Choosing between them comes down to one question — what shape of answer do you want back: a line of text, one pick from a list, several picks, a file, or nothing at all.

Here is the full set, group by group, with the settings each type opens up in the Field Properties panel on the right. It pays to decide before you build: a field keeps the type it was created with, so turning a Short Text into an Email later means deleting the question and starting it again.

Essentials, Input, Choice, Upload and Layout stack down the left as collapsible groups. Essentials is a shortcut rather than a category — Heading, Short Text, Paragraph and Submit Button, the four pieces most forms open with, each repeated in its proper group further down.

Input holds the typed answers: Short Text, Long Text, Email, Number, Phone and Date. Choice holds Dropdown, Radio and Checkbox. Upload holds a single type, File Upload. Layout holds the pieces that display something rather than ask anything: Heading, Paragraph, Divider, Image, Page Break, Hidden and Submit Button.

Whichever type you pick, the sequence is the same: add it, select it, then fill in the panel on the right.

Short Text and Long Text differ in the size of the box and little else: one line with an optional Max length, against a taller box whose height you set with Rows. A vehicle registration is short text; "describe the fault" is long text.

Email, Number, Phone and Date each narrow what will be accepted before the form can be sent. Number carries Min, Max and Step — Step 0.5 for half-day bookings, Min 1 for a quantity nobody should be able to zero out. Date carries Min date and Max date, which is what stops a service booking landing last Tuesday. Most of these also take a Field width: Small (25%), Medium (50%), Large (75%) or Full width, so a postcode and a town can share a line.

Dropdown, Radio and Checkbox all read from the same Options list; what changes is what the visitor may do with it. Radio lays every choice out at once and takes exactly one — right for the four or five options where seeing them together is part of the decision. Dropdown hides the same single-answer list behind a select control, which is what twenty counties want. Checkbox is the only type that accepts more than one answer.

A single Checkbox option, labelled with your terms and marked Required, is how a form records that someone agreed to them. It is a tick box rather than a signature, and there is no e-signature field.

File Upload takes one file per field, up to 2 MB. Two documents means two File Upload fields — one labelled "Signed lease", one "Proof of address". On an encrypted form the file is encrypted in the visitor's browser before it leaves the page, and decrypted in yours when you open the submission.

Nothing in Layout collects an answer. Heading breaks a long form into named parts, and while a new form is still called "My new form", renaming the first Heading renames the form as well. Paragraph carries formatted explanation, Divider draws a rule, Image places a picture, and Page Break splits the form into pages with Back and Next buttons. Hidden is never seen by anyone: it takes its value from a URL parameter matching its label, so a link ending ?source=newsletter fills a Hidden field labelled source.