A Complete Guide to Form Management

Would you like to learn more about how to manage your WordPress forms? WPForms makes it easy to organize and manage all your forms right from the WordPress admin area.

This guide will answer some of the most common questions about form management in WPForms.


Before getting started, you’ll first need to make sure WPForms is installed and activated on your WordPress site and that you’ve verified your license. Then, be sure to create a form if you haven’t already.

Viewing Your Forms

To view all your forms in the WordPress admin area, go to WPForms » All Forms. This will take you to the Forms Overview page. Here, you’ll see a list of all the forms on your site, along with their entry counts.

Forms Overview page

Accessing Form Options

Once you’re on the Forms Overview page you can quickly access options for managing each form. To display these options, simply hover over an individual form’s name.

Form options

Here you’ll see the following options:

  • Edit: This link takes you to the form builder, where you can make changes to this specific form.
  • Entries: This will take you to the form’s Entries page, where you can view and manage your entries.
  • Preview: This allows you to see how the form looks on the frontend of your site. You can also use it to submit test entries.
  • Duplicate: Creates a duplicate of the form. This is a great way to test or repurpose forms.
  • Trash: Adds the form to the trash.

Adding Your Forms to the Trash

From the Forms Overview page, you can remove forms from your site by adding them to the trash.

Note: You won’t be able to use the form on your site or access the form’s entries when it’s in the trash. To use the form and access the entries again, you’ll need to restore your form.

Forms are not automatically deleted and will remain in the trash until you permanently delete them.

To add an individual form to the trash, hover over the form and click the Trash option.

Click trash option

When the form has been successfully added to the trash, you’ll see a confirmation notice at the top of the page.

Form trash success notice

If you’d like to add multiple forms to the trash at once, check the box next to each form you’d like to add.

Select multiple forms

Alternatively, you can select all your forms by checking the box next to Name.

Select all forms checkbox

Once you’ve chosen the forms you’d like to add to the trash, select the Trash option from the Bulk actions dropdown.

Select trash bulk action

When you’re ready to add the forms to the Trash, click the Apply button.

Click apply button

Next, we’ll cover how to view and manage the forms in the trash.

Viewing Your Forms on the Trash Screen

Once you’ve added forms to the trash, you can view them by clicking on the Trash link.

Click trash link

This will take you to the trash screen where you can view the forms that are currently in the trash.

Trash screen view

From here, you’ll have the option to restore or permanently delete your forms. We’ll cover both of these options below.

Restoring Your Forms

Restoring a form removes it from the trash and adds it back to the Forms Overview page. This lets you use the form on your site again,  and also gives you access to the form’s entries.

To restore a form, hover over the form name and click the Restore option.

Restore form

After you click the Restore option, you’ll see a confirmation notice letting you know that the form has been successfully restored.

Restored form confirmation notice

Now you’ll be able to use the form on your site again, and you’ll also have access to the form’s entries.

Permanently Deleting Your Forms

Note: Permanently deleting a form will remove the form and its entries entirely from your site’s database. Before proceeding, we recommended creating a backup of your site’s database.

To permanently delete a form, hover over the form name and click the Delete Permanently option.

Delete permanently

When you select the Delete Permanently option, an overlay will appear asking you to confirm the deletion. To confirm, click the OK button.

Confirm deletion of forms

You’ll now see a confirmation notice at the top of the page letting you know the form has been permanently deleted.

Deleted permanently confirmation message

Emptying Your Trash

You can permanently delete all the forms in the trash by clicking the Empty Trash button.

Click empty trash button

Then, you’ll see an overlay asking you to confirm the deletion of all the forms that are in the trash. To confirm, click the OK button.

Confirm multiple form deletion

After all the forms have been successfully deleted, you’ll see a confirmation notice at the top of the page.

Multiple forms deleted successfully

Organizing Your Forms

Within the Forms Overview page, there are several ways you can organize your forms. For example, you can customize the page layout and sort your forms. We’ll cover each of these options below.

Customizing the Page Layout

You can choose which columns are included in the form rows and how many form rows are displayed on each page. To do this, click on the Screen Options tab on the top right corner of the page.

Screen Options

This will display customization options for columns and rows.

Screen option settings

Customizing Form Columns

Here is a list of the possible columns that can be included in each form row:

  • Author: The user that created the form.
  • Shortcode: This is the shortcode that includes the form ID.
  • Created: The date that the form was created.
  • Entries: This shows the number of entries the form has.

Form column options

All boxes that are checked will be displayed in a separate column on the Forms Overview page. By default, each row will display each form’s name, shortcode, date created, and number of entries.

Form column

If you’d like, you can change what’s included in the row by checking or unchecking the box next to each column option. For this example, we’ll include the author of the form by checking the box next to Author.

Select author

When you’re ready, go ahead and click the Apply button to save your changes.

Click apply button

Now, on the Forms Overview page, you’ll see who created the form under the Author column.

Author column

Customizing Form Rows

If you’d like to customize the number of form rows displayed on the Forms Overview page, you can do so within the Screen Options. Simply change the number in the box next to Number of forms per page. For example, we’ll change it to 5, so only 5 forms are displayed on a single page.

Pagination

Once you’ve added the number of forms you’d like to view per page, click on the Apply button to save your changes.

Save changes

Sorting Your Forms

Sorting your forms with a single click is a great way to quickly organize your forms. On the Forms Overview page, you can sort your forms by form name, author, or date created.

Sorting by Form Name

To sort your forms alphabetically by form name, click on the Name link on the top left of the form table.

Click name link

Sorting by Author

If you’d like to sort your forms alphabetically by form author, click the Author link.

Click author link

Sorting by Date Created

To organize the forms by the date they were created, click on the Created link.

Click created link

Searching for Forms

Searching for forms on the Forms Overview page is a great way to quickly locate specific forms by form name or description. To search for a form, enter keywords in the search bar and click the Search Forms button.

Click search forms button

Any forms that contain the keywords in the form name or description will appear in the search results.

Search results

If you’d like to clear your search results, simply click the X icon.

Clear search results

Using Form Revisions

Form revisions make it easy to restore earlier versions of your forms, view when forms were updated, and see which users made changes.

To view form revisions, you’ll first need to access the form builder. Then, click on the form revisions icon located in the bottom-left corner of the form builder.

Click form revisions icon

This will take you to the Form Revisions panel, where you can browse and manage your form revisions.

Form revisions panel

For more in-depth details, be sure to check out our tutorial on using form revisions in WPForms.

That’s it! Now you know all the different ways to manage your forms.

Next, are you wondering what you can do with the information a user submits through your forms? Be sure to check out our complete guide to form entries for all the details.