You have a question. Print the ballot.
A poll is a question and up to ten fixed choices, sitting on the event page itself. Signed-in guests mark one. Nobody reads the count until they have voted.
Which support act should open on Saturday?
Mark one choice only. One ballot per person, per date. You will see the count as soon as you have marked it.
What a poll is
One question. A fixed set of choices. Nothing else to fill in.
Per event
Up to 5 polls
One event can carry five polls at once, each with its own question and its own count. Ask about the running order and the start time without making people fill in a form.
Per poll
2 to 10 choices
A ballot needs at least two choices and holds at most ten. That ceiling counts write-ins too, so an open ballot fills up rather than sprawling.
Per person
One vote
Voting needs an account, so the count is people rather than clicks. One mark each, and it cannot be taken back and cast again.
Polls are on the Pro plan. See what that costs
The two states
Nobody sees the count until they have voted.
This is the one rule that makes the answer worth reading. Until a guest marks the ballot they get choices and nothing else: no running total, no leading option, nothing to fall in behind. The instant they vote, the whole count comes back to them.
Before the mark
what a guest seesWhich support act should open on Saturday?
Four choices, laid out full width so a thumb can hit them.
Not signed in? While the poll is open the choices are there to read, with a sign-in link where the buttons would be. Still no count.
After the mark
39 votesWhich support act should open on Saturday?
The same poll, one second later, from the same screen.
The leading choice is set in bold. The bar for the one you marked is your schedule's accent colour at full strength with a check beside it, the leader gets the same colour at half strength, and every other bar stays gray.
Organizers are the exception. You can read the count from the event editor whenever you like, whether or not you voted yourself.
The seal
The first vote seals the choices.
Up to that moment a poll is yours to rewrite. From the moment one person has voted, the option list is locked. A count is only worth reading if everybody who answered was answering the same ballot, so the software will not let the ballot move underneath them.
- Still yours: the wording of the question, the two write-in switches, whether the poll is open or closed, and deleting it outright.
- Set for good: the choices themselves, for as long as a single vote exists against them.
- Write-ins are the one way a choice joins a sealed ballot, and only if you allowed them.
Which support act should open on Saturday?
Question: editable. Status: open or closed, your call. Write-ins: yours to switch on. Choices: fixed for the life of the poll.
The declaration
Close the poll and read out the count.
Closing stops new votes and leaves the result standing. From that point the count is on show to everyone: people who never voted, and people who are not signed in. It is labelled Closed, so nobody has to guess whether it is still running. Reopen it whenever you want and voting starts again.
Which support act should open on Saturday?
39 votes · Closed| Choice | Tally | Votes | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sunhouse | 16 | 41% | |
| Marker Bay ✓ | 11 | 28% | |
| Two Rivers | 8 | 21% | |
| The Lamplighters Write-in | 4 | 10% | |
Percentages are the share of 39 votes cast on this date. The leading choice is set in bold, and the solid bar with the check beside it is the choice this voter made.
Write-ins
Let them add the choice you did not think of.
Turn write-ins on for a poll and a signed-in guest gets a box under the choices. Whatever they add joins the ballot, up to the same ceiling of ten, and it counts as their vote, so nobody has to add a choice and then remember to pick it.
Straight onto the ballot
With approval off, a write-in appears in the choices immediately, with its author's vote already on it. Good for a small room you trust.
Or into a queue
With approval on, it waits in a pending list on the event editor, counted on a badge on the Polls tab. Approve it and it joins the ballot with its author's vote attached. Reject it and it is gone.
Duplicates never reach you
A suggestion that matches a choice already on the ballot, or one already waiting in the queue, is refused at the point somebody types it, whatever the capitalisation.
A nudge when they pile up
Switch the notification on and, once your schedule has its own email settings, owners and admins get a once-a-day email while suggestions are sitting unanswered. It is off until you ask for it, and the badge in the editor is the signal either way.
Added by a guest
The Lamplighters
Waiting on the event editor. Approve it and it becomes choice number four, carrying the vote of the person who wrote it in.
Recurring events
A weekly night gets a fresh ballot every week.
If the event repeats, the vote is recorded against the date the guest is looking at. Somebody who voted at last Thursday's session votes again at this Thursday's, and each date keeps its own count instead of pooling a month of answers into one bar. On a one-off event there is simply the one count.
The poll itself is written once, on the event. It is the counting that splits by date. How recurring events work
Where it appears
Handed out where they already are.
On the event page
ProThe poll sits with the event's photos, videos and comments, under the details somebody came to read. No second link to send, no separate survey to chase.
If the event is a draft, the poll is only reachable by the people who can already see the event. The same holds for the Internal and Unlisted visibilities, which are Enterprise.
Inside the calendar
ProOpen an event's card on your schedule and the poll is right there, votable without leaving the calendar.
In a newsletter
ProDrop a poll block into a newsletter and it fills itself with the first open poll on your next event that has one: the question, the choices, and a Vote now button back to the event.
On a phone, which is where it will be read
ProEach choice is a full-width button with a real touch target, so voting from a bar or a bus stop takes one tap and no pinching.
The bars that come back use your schedule's accent colour for your own choice and the leading one, so the poll looks like the rest of your page rather than a bolted-on widget.
In the event editor
ProWrite the poll, watch the vote count against it, close it, reopen it, or delete it, all from the Polls tab under Engagement.
And the reason people are signed in at all
FreeVoting needs an account, and an account is also how somebody follows your schedule. Following is free on every plan, and it is what lets you email them later about the thing they just voted on.
To be exact about it: following does not send anybody an automatic alert when you add an event. It builds the list you write to. How newsletters work
The small print
Every number on one page.
The limits are the feature. Here they all are, so nothing surprises you after you have asked three hundred people a question.
- Polls on one event
- Up to 5
- Choices on one poll
- 2 to 10, write-ins included
- Length of a question
- Up to 500 characters
- Length of a choice
- Up to 200 characters
- Votes per person
- One, per poll, per date
- Changing your vote
- Not possible once cast
- Voting without an account
- Not possible
- Reading the count
- After you vote, or once the poll closes
- Editing the choices
- Until the first vote lands
- Plan
- Pro, and included on Enterprise
Selfhosted installations have the Pro feature set, so polls are available there without a subscription.
Related features
Keep reading
Free forever. Upgrade when you're ready.
Zero platform fees on ticket sales. You only pay Stripe's processing fee.
See all plansFrequently asked questions
What people ask before they put a question to a room.
How do event polls work?
You add a poll to an event: a question, and between two and ten choices. It shows up on the event page and inside that event's card on your calendar. A signed-in guest marks one choice, the vote is recorded, and the count comes straight back with a bar, a number and a percentage against every choice. One event can carry up to five polls.
Who can create polls?
Anyone who can edit the event, on a schedule with the Pro plan. Polls live on the Polls tab of the event editor's Engagement section, and you can read the results there whenever you like, whether or not you have voted yourself.
Can guests see the results before voting?
No. Until a guest votes they see the choices and nothing else: no totals, no percentages, no leading option. The count appears the moment they mark the ballot. The one exception is a closed poll, because closing it publishes the result to everybody, including people who never voted and people who are not signed in.
Do guests need an account to vote?
Yes. A vote is tied to an account, which is what stops one person voting twice. Guests who are not signed in see the choices with a sign-in link in place of the buttons. Votes cannot be changed once they are cast.
Can guests add a choice of their own?
Yes, if you turn write-ins on for that poll. A signed-in guest can add a choice, up to the same ceiling of ten. Turn approval on as well and their suggestion waits in a pending queue on the Polls tab of the event editor until you approve or reject it, and approving it adds the choice with its author's vote already attached. A suggestion that duplicates a choice already on the ballot is refused before it reaches you.
What happens on a recurring event?
Each date is polled separately. A vote is recorded against the date the guest is looking at, so a weekly event collects a fresh count every week instead of pooling a month of answers into one bar. On a one-off event there is simply the one count.
Can I change the choices after people start voting?
No, and that is deliberate. Once a poll holds a single vote the option list is locked, so everyone who voted was answering the same ballot. The question text can still be edited, and you can close the poll, reopen it or delete it at any point.
Is there a free version of polls?
Polls are a Pro feature at $9 a month, included on Enterprise, and selfhosted installations get them too. If you want to ask your audience something on the free plan, newsletters are free at 10 emails a month, counted per recipient rather than per send, and collecting followers costs nothing on any plan.
Free to start
Stop guessing. Put it to a vote.
Claim your schedule, publish your events, and add a poll to the next one. Publishing is free forever. Polls are on the Pro plan at $9 a month.
No credit card required