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Dynamic question import and substring matching

  • October 22, 2025
  • 5 replies
  • 59 views

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Hello Qualtrics Community,
 
I'm new to qualtrics and I'm working on building a survey. However, I'm not sure if what I am wanting to do is possible.
 
The first thing is that I'm trying to dynamically display images and image/question-specific metadata. From a .csv containing 1000+ questions and their labels, I want to create questions directly from the .csv and essentially import the corresponding image, image metadata, and other related information (rather than doing it by hand). Alternatively, I was wondering if it is possible to create all 1000+ questions programmatically and then deploy static questions in a random order in the survey.
 
The second thing is dynamic typing into a field. I have ~4000 possible answer choices and dropdowns/multiple choice would be too cumbersome. Some of these answer choices are synonymous with one another so it would ideal that they would retain that synonymy behind the scenes. Essentially when a user begins to type in their answer to the question, a list of answer choices will appear based on what they type (i.e. substring matching). Ideally the users must pick from the choices that appear instead of sending in a free-form written response to the question.
 
Thank you!
 
@adurso 

5 replies

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  • 319 replies
  • October 23, 2025

Not too sure about the first portion.

For the second portion, if you are working through the questions manually, you could potentially use select2 for the typing to search for a choice.

Thanks to Tom_1842 for his qsf examples on this thread.


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  • Author
  • 1 reply
  • October 28, 2025

Thank you ​@Chee Heng_SZ ! This is super helpful. I appreciate it.


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  • Qualtrics Employee
  • 31 replies
  • November 10, 2025

Hello, Myn!

Qualtrics supports dynamic typing (autocomplete) into survey fields via the 'Autocomplete' question type, also known as Supplemental Data Service (SDS) lookup. This is suitable when you have a very large number of answer choices (such as ~4000) that would be cumbersome in dropdowns or multiple-choice lists. When a respondent begins typing, the list of matching choices (based on substring matching) appears for selection, ensuring respondents pick from the preset list rather than entering free-form text.

Additionally, Qualtrics supports treating synonymous answer choices by managing the underlying data to standardize synonymous inputs behind the scenes, though this would typically require careful setup of your lookup data or using Embedded Data coupled with your SDS file.

You can find more details and how to set this up in the Qualtrics support page for Autocomplete Questions with Supplemental Data: https://www.qualtrics.com/support/survey-platform/editing-questions/question-types-guide/standard-content/autocomplete-questions-supplemental-data/

This approach is indeed a recommended workaround when you need dynamic typing with many potential answers and want to avoid cumbersome dropdowns while maintaining data consistency.


Forum|alt.badge.img+21
  • 319 replies
  • November 11, 2025

Hello, Myn!

Qualtrics supports dynamic typing (autocomplete) into survey fields via the 'Autocomplete' question type, also known as Supplemental Data Service (SDS) lookup. This is suitable when you have a very large number of answer choices (such as ~4000) that would be cumbersome in dropdowns or multiple-choice lists. When a respondent begins typing, the list of matching choices (based on substring matching) appears for selection, ensuring respondents pick from the preset list rather than entering free-form text.

Additionally, Qualtrics supports treating synonymous answer choices by managing the underlying data to standardize synonymous inputs behind the scenes, though this would typically require careful setup of your lookup data or using Embedded Data coupled with your SDS file.

You can find more details and how to set this up in the Qualtrics support page for Autocomplete Questions with Supplemental Data: https://www.qualtrics.com/support/survey-platform/editing-questions/question-types-guide/standard-content/autocomplete-questions-supplemental-data/

This approach is indeed a recommended workaround when you need dynamic typing with many potential answers and want to avoid cumbersome dropdowns while maintaining data consistency.

Updated link for SDS as Lpena’s link got an error.

However, the current autocompletes using SDS seems to only search from the very first letter of the whole text. (E.g. searching “4” will not show “Team 4”)

Select2 search from within any substring (E.g. searching “com” can show “Company”, “Accompany” and “telecom”.) and allows more customisations.

 


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  • Qualtrics Employee
  • 31 replies
  • November 11, 2025

To properly troubleshoot this issue and securely access your account for a deeper review, please submit a ticket through your Customer Success Hub.

This is the fastest and most secure way to get a personalized resolution:

 

➡️ https://support-portal.qualtrics.com/

 

We look forward to taking a closer look!