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Chobble Tickets vs Google Forms

Google Forms is free and everyone knows how to use it, but it wasn't built for event ticketing.

Open source & full ticketing Google Forms alternative

Chobble Tickets is a white label ticketing platform made in the UK by a community interest company, with its source code published under the AGPL-3.0-only licence.

Google Forms collects responses. It does not take payment, issue tickets, enforce a capacity limit, or scan anyone in at the door, so organisers using it end up chasing payments and counting rows in a spreadsheet by hand.

Chobble Tickets does those jobs: card payment through Stripe, Square or SumUp, an emailed ticket with a QR code, capacity limits per event and per date, and check-in scanning. It costs £50/year or £5/month, or £25/year for charities, community groups and schools on the annual plan.

What Google Forms gives you

Google Forms is free, easy to set up, and familiar, so you can collect registrations, export to a spreadsheet, and share a link. For a simple free event with no capacity limit, it gets the job done.

Both tools share some features

  • Free event registration (no payment required)
  • Shareable via a simple link
  • Embeddable on your own website
  • Works on any device with a browser
  • Email notifications after submission

Google Forms has advantages Chobble Tickets doesn't

  • Completely free - no annual fee, no per-ticket fees, no payment processing fees (because it doesn't process payments)
  • Everyone knows how to use it - near-zero learning curve for both organisers and respondents
  • Unlimited custom questions with any field type - add text, dropdowns, grids, file uploads, and more (Chobble supports multiple-choice custom questions)
  • Google Sheets integration - responses automatically flow into a spreadsheet for analysis, mail merge, and sharing
  • Conditional logic - show or hide questions based on previous answers
  • Collaboration - multiple people can edit the form simultaneously with real-time Google Docs collaboration
  • Third-party add-ons - third-party add-ons can add features like response limits, email notifications, and more
  • Templates - start from pre-built templates for common use cases
  • Embedded anywhere - embed in any website with an iframe snippet

What Google Forms doesn't do

Google Forms wasn't designed for ticketing, so it's missing things you'll eventually need:

  • No payment processing - you can't sell tickets through a Google Form (you'd need a separate payment tool)
  • No capacity management - forms don't close when you're sold out (without manual intervention or add-ons)
  • No confirmation tickets - respondents get a copy of their answers, not a proper ticket with a QR code
  • No check-in system - you'll need to print a list and manually check names at the door
  • No encryption - attendee data sits in a Google Sheet with whatever sharing settings you remembered to set
  • Google owns the data - your attendees' information is on Google's servers, subject to Google's terms
  • No refund management - no way to track or process refunds
  • No attendee communication - no built-in way to email ticket holders with updates
  • No multi-event management - each form is independent with no dashboard across events

What Chobble Tickets adds over Google Forms

Chobble Tickets is a purpose-built ticketing platform, so it handles things Google Forms can't:

When Google Forms is fine

If you're running a free, informal event and don't need tickets or check-in, Google Forms is perfectly fine. It's free, everyone knows how to use it, and it connects to Google Sheets.

When Chobble Tickets is worth it

Once you need payments, capacity limits, QR code tickets, or data privacy, a dedicated ticketing platform like Chobble Tickets is worth the £50/year (or £5/month). It also supports free events without payment setup, so you can start with the same simplicity as Google Forms and add payments later when you need them.

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