Best Free Form Builders for Restaurants
Tally has the free plan a restaurant is least likely to outgrow: unlimited forms, unlimited submissions, and payments included, so the catering form, the private-event form, the job application and the feedback survey can each take a deposit without a monthly count running down. Fillout comes close, with unlimited forms, 1,000 responses a month and payments on the free tier.
The other builders trade one limit against another. Jotform, Cognito Forms and Zoho Forms take payments for free but meter submissions, at 100 or 500 a month. Typeform and Youform keep payments for paying customers. And the free counts differ in shape as well as size: forms.app gives unlimited responses on only five forms, while Microsoft Forms allows 400 forms but stops each one at 200 responses in total.
Our picks
- Best for deposits without a monthly cap: Tally. Unlimited forms and unlimited submissions under a fair-use policy, with payments, signatures and file uploads all on the free plan.
- Best for an owner and several managers: Fillout. 1,000 responses a month, unlimited forms and no per-seat charge, so everyone works in one account without paying.
- Best for ready-made restaurant templates: Jotform. Includes restaurant order, reservation and event-booking templates, and takes deposits free up to ten paid submissions a month.
- Best for pricing a party by headcount: Cognito Forms. Its calculation engine can price a headcount and add tax before the customer pays, with payments and unlimited forms free.
- Best for a restaurant website on WordPress: Fluent Forms. Conditional logic and Stripe payments are in the free version, and entries are stored on your own hosting with no cap.
At a glance
| Option | Free plan responses | Free plan forms | Takes payments | Cheapest paid plan |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free, no published limitsource | Free, no published limitsource | Google Workspace Starter, $7 per user per monthsource | ||
| 100-999source | 10 or moresource | Microsoft 365 Personal, $99.99/yearsource | ||
| 100-999source | 3 to 9source | Included on the free plansource | Bronze, $34 per month billed annuallysource | |
| Unlimitedsource | Unlimitedsource | Included on the free plansource | Pro, $24 per monthsource | |
| Under 100source | Unlimitedsource | Paid plans onlysource | Basic, 28 USD per monthsource | |
| 1,000 or moresource | Unlimitedsource | Included on the free plansource | Starter, $15 per monthsource | |
| Unlimitedsource | 3 to 9source | Included on the free plansource | Basic, 19 USD per month billed annually (29 USD monthly)source | |
| 100-999source | Unlimitedsource | Included on the free plansource | Pro, $24 per monthsource | |
| 100-999source | 3 to 9source | Included on the free plansource | Basic, US$10 per month billed annuallysource | |
| 100-999source | 3 to 9source | Starter, billed $195 annually ($16.25 a month)source | ||
| Free, no published limitsource | Free, no published limitsource | Included on the free plansource | Elite licence, $239.60/year (normally $599)source | |
| Unlimitedsource | Unlimitedsource | Paid plans onlysource | Pro, $29 per month (or $20 per month billed annually)source | |
| Free, no published limitsource | Free, no published limitsource | Included on the free plansource | Single Site License, $63/year (normally $79)source |
Free response limits in a busy catering season
Typeform's free plan stops at ten responses a month across every form you own, less than three a week. Jotform, Cognito and Wufoo allow 100 a month, and Jotform and Cognito count that across all your forms together. Zoho Forms allows 500, Fillout 1,000, and Tally, forms.app and Youform publish no monthly ceiling at all.
Microsoft Forms counts differently. A free personal account stops a form at 200 responses in total, not per month, so a steady catering form eventually has to be exported, cleared and reused. Google Forms publishes no cap on responses or forms, and each submission lands in a Google Sheet.
Which free form builders take a catering deposit
Eight of the thirteen include payments on the free plan: Jotform, Tally, Fillout, forms.app, Cognito Forms, Zoho Forms, WPForms Lite and Fluent Forms. Two of those cap it, Jotform and Zoho at ten paid submissions a month, which covers occasional deposits but not steady online ordering. Typeform and Youform hold payments back for paid plans, and Google Forms and Microsoft Forms have no built-in payment field, so a deposit there means sending an invoice or a payment link separately.
Resumes are the other attachment worth checking. forms.app's free storage is 10 MB, which makes it a poor fit for job applications with files, while Zoho's 200 MB is enough to accept them.
WPForms Lite or Fluent Forms on your own site
Both need an existing WordPress site, both store entries on your own hosting, and both take Stripe payments free. The difference is what they hold back. WPForms Lite keeps conditional logic and file uploads for Pro, and its cheapest paid option listed here is the Elite licence at $239.60/year. Fluent Forms includes conditional logic free, so a catering form can branch on party size, and its Single Site License is $63/year.
The options in detail
Google Forms
The default answer for a restaurant that just needs a form up today: catering inquiries, a staff availability sheet, a post-meal feedback survey. It is genuinely free with a Google account, publishes no cap on responses or forms, and every submission drops into a Google Sheet your managers can already read. The gap that matters for a restaurant is money: Google Forms has no built-in way to take a deposit, so a catering booking still needs an invoice or a payment link pasted into the confirmation. Design control is thin too, and forms look unmistakably like Google Forms.
Microsoft Forms
Microsoft's counterpart to Google Forms, free with an ordinary Outlook.com or Hotmail account and the obvious pick if your back office already runs on Microsoft 365. You can build up to 400 separate forms, which covers a catering inquiry, a private-event request, a job application and a feedback survey with room to spare. The catch is the shape of the free cap: a free personal account stops a form at 200 responses in total, not 200 a month, so a busy catering form eventually has to be exported, cleared and reused. There is no built-in payment collection either.
Jotform
The most restaurant-ready free plan of the mainstream builders, because payment integrations are included rather than paywalled: a catering order form can take a deposit on the free Starter plan, up to ten paid submissions a month. Jotform's template library is the largest here and includes ready-made restaurant order, reservation and event-booking forms. The limits are the binding constraint: five forms and 100 submissions a month across all of them, and every free form carries Jotform branding. A restaurant taking more than a few inquiries a week will hit the ceiling.
Tally
The standout free plan in this table: unlimited forms and unlimited submissions, with payments, signatures and file uploads all included rather than held back for paying customers. For a restaurant that means one form for catering, one for private events, one for job applications and one for feedback, none of them counting down a monthly allowance, and a deposit collectable on any of them. Tally is subject to a fair-use policy rather than a published number, and the paid Pro plan exists mainly to remove Tally branding and add a custom domain. The editor is deliberately plain, closer to a document than a form designer.
Typeform
The best-looking forms here, one question at a time, which suits a private-dining inquiry you want to feel like part of the restaurant's brand. It is the worst free plan in this table for actually running a restaurant: ten responses a month across every form you own, and the payment question is paid-only, so no deposits. Typeform has also stopped showing the free plan on its pricing page at all, which tells you where it sits in the company's thinking. Treat the free tier as a way to try the builder, not to run your catering inbox.
Fillout
The most generous free plan that still looks and behaves like a modern form builder: unlimited forms, 1,000 responses a month, and no per-seat charge, so an owner and two managers can all work in the same account without paying. Payments, scheduling forms and file uploads are all in the free tier, which covers a catering deposit and a private-event booking in one tool. It is less known than Jotform or Typeform, so there are fewer restaurant-specific templates to start from, and the interface assumes some comfort with conditional logic and integrations.
forms.app
An unusual split among free plans: unlimited responses but only five forms, which is the opposite trade-off to Jotform and Wufoo. For a restaurant that is often the better deal, because the four or five forms you actually need (catering, private events, jobs, feedback) fit inside the limit while a busy inquiry season does not blow through a monthly allowance. Payments are included free, and so are unlimited team members, so managers do not need to share one login. File storage on the free plan is only 10 MB, so it is a poor fit if you want resumes attached to job applications.
Cognito Forms
Cognito puts payments on every plan including the free one, and pairs that with unlimited forms, so a restaurant can run separate catering, event and application forms and take a deposit on any of them without paying anything. The ceiling is entries: 100 a month on the Always Free tier, shared across all your forms, and free forms carry Cognito branding. Its calculation and conditional-logic engine is stronger than most competitors', which matters if a catering form needs to price a headcount and add tax before the customer pays.
Zoho Forms
The free plan with the highest submission ceiling of the metered builders: 500 a month, five times Jotform's or Wufoo's, plus 200 MB of file storage, which is enough to accept resumes on a job application. Payments are included free but capped at ten paid submissions a month, so it suits taking occasional catering deposits rather than running steady online ordering. Three forms is the pinch point for a restaurant that wants a separate form for each purpose. Zoho Forms is most compelling if you already use other Zoho tools, since the whole suite shares one login and one contact record.
Wufoo
One of the oldest form builders still running, and it shows in a free plan that has not moved with the market: five forms, 100 entries a month, and only ten fields per form, which a catering inquiry asking for date, headcount, menu and contact details will use up quickly. Payments and file uploads are both absent from the free plan's feature list and appear only from the paid Starter tier up. Wufoo is dependable and simple, and the reporting is better than the free-plan limits suggest, but for a restaurant in 2026 it is hard to pick over Tally, Fillout or Jotform.
WPForms Lite
Only an option if the restaurant's website runs on WordPress, but in that case it is a strong one: the forms live on your own site and database, so no vendor is metering your submissions. Stripe payments are included in the free Lite version, which covers catering deposits. The Lite/Pro split is the thing to check before committing, because file uploads and conditional logic are both Pro features, so a job application that accepts a resume or a catering form that changes questions based on headcount needs the paid licence. Reviewers also note the free version limits what you can see of stored entries.
Youform
A newer, cheaper answer to Typeform: the same one-question-at-a-time style with unlimited forms and unlimited responses on the free plan, plus file uploads up to 10 MB. For a restaurant collecting catering inquiries at volume that is a far better free deal than Typeform's ten responses a month. The trade-off is payments, which are held back for the Pro plan, so deposits are not collectable free. The free tier is also single-user, so an owner and a manager cannot both have logins without upgrading, and being a small product it has fewer integrations than the established names.
Fluent Forms
The other serious free WordPress form plugin, and the more generous of the two: conditional logic, form scheduling and Stripe payments are all in the free version, where WPForms holds logic back for Pro. For a restaurant on WordPress that means a catering form can branch on party size and take a deposit without buying a licence. Everything is stored on your own hosting, so there is no monthly submission cap to watch. It needs a WordPress site to exist at all, and the paid tier is sold as an annual per-site licence rather than a subscription, which suits a single restaurant better than a group.
How we researched this
The word free set the list. Paperform, Formstack, Gravity Forms and Formsite were left out because none has a free plan; Formsite's is a 14-day trial. We dropped 123FormBuilder because its plan card could not be found (its own FAQ says the free plan now allows one form and 10 fields), HubSpot Forms because it publishes no form or submission limit, and Formaloo because its pricing page gives two different submission limits for the same free tier. SurveyMonkey was left out as a survey tool. Typeform and Wufoo stay in on purpose: owners will consider them, and the table shows where their free plans fall short.
Typeform no longer shows its free plan on its pricing page, so its limits come from its help center. Google and Microsoft sell no paid tier for forms alone, so their paid cells name a whole office suite. Three payment cells are empty because Google, Microsoft and Wufoo never say in words whether their free plans take payments. Free tiers do get trimmed, so reread a builder's plan card on the day you set up your catering form.