How to Duplicate a Google Form on iPhone (2026 Guide)
Why Duplicate Instead of Edit?
Editing a live form that already has responses is how data gets mangled: old submissions stop matching new questions, and the response sheet turns into a puzzle. Duplicating gives you a clean copy with the same structure and an empty response set — the original and its data stay frozen.
Typical reasons to copy:
- Rerunning a weekly report, sign-up sheet, or feedback survey with a fresh response set.
- Reusing a quiz for a new class or term (answer keys carry over).
- Keeping a master template you clone for each event.
- Building variant A/B versions of the same survey.
Method 1: From the Form Editor (Safari)
- Open forms.google.com in Safari on your iPhone and open the form.
- Tap the ⋮ (three-dot) menu in the top-right of the editor.
- Tap Make a copy.
- In the dialog, rename the copy (default is Copy of …), decide whether to tick Share it with the same people, and confirm.
The copy opens immediately in the editor, ready to adjust and send. This is the method to remember; the other two exist for when you are starting somewhere else.
A note if you duplicate forms a lot: in our Forms for Google Drive iOS app the same operation is native — open a form, duplicate, rename — and the app ships with ready-made templates, which often replaces the “keep a master template form” workaround entirely.
Method 2: From the Forms Home Page
If you are looking at your list of forms at forms.google.com rather than inside one: tap the ⋮ menu on the form’s card in the list, then Make a copy. Same dialog, same result — handy when duplicating several forms in a row without opening each one.
Method 3: From the Google Drive App
The Drive iOS app can copy a form like any other file: locate the form, tap its ⋮ menu → Make a copy. The caveat is that Drive drops the copy in the same folder without opening it, and gives you no rename or share dialog — you will still end up in Safari to actually edit it. Use this when you are already organizing files in Drive; otherwise Method 1 is faster.
What a Copy Keeps — and What It Doesn’t
| Carries over | Does not carry over |
|---|---|
| Questions, sections, branching | Responses and the linked response sheet |
| Theme, header image, question images | The original’s share/respond URL |
| Quiz mode, answer keys, points | Respondent notifications history |
| Settings (email collection, limits) | Collaborators (unless you tick the box) |
Two follow-ups worth doing on every fresh copy: re-check the Settings tab (the copy inherits the original’s email-collection and sign-in settings, which may not suit the new audience), and generate a new link or QR code — the copy has its own URL.
Starting Fresh Instead?
Duplication reuses structure you already have. If the next form is genuinely different, it can be faster to create one from scratch on iPhone — or to generate the first draft with AI from a text description and edit from there.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does duplicating a Google Form copy the responses too?
No — and this is usually what you want. A copy includes the questions, settings, theme, and images, but starts with zero responses and its own empty response sheet. Your original form keeps its responses untouched. There is no built-in option to copy a form together with its response data.
Do collaborators carry over to the copy?
Only if you say so. When you tap Make a copy, Google shows a 'Share it with the same people' checkbox. Leave it unchecked and the copy is private to you; tick it and everyone who could edit the original can edit the copy. Respondent access is never copied — the new form has a new response URL that you share separately.
Can I copy someone else's Google Form?
Only with editor access. If someone shares a form with you as an editor (a collaborator), Make a copy works and the duplicate lands in your own Drive. A form shared with you only as a respondent — the fill-out link — cannot be copied; ask the owner to add you as a collaborator or share a template link instead.
Does the copy keep quiz settings and answer keys?
Yes. Quiz mode, answer keys, point values, and feedback text all carry over into the duplicate, which is what makes copying the fastest way to reuse last term's quiz. Remember the copy also keeps the same collect-email and sign-in settings, so re-check the Settings tab if the new audience differs.
Where does the duplicated form get saved?
In your Drive, in the same folder as the original if you own it, otherwise in your My Drive root. The copy is named 'Copy of [original name]' — rename it right away from the editor's title field to avoid a Drive full of identical 'Copy of' entries.
Is there a way to keep a master template form?
The simple convention: build the form once, name it with a TEMPLATE prefix, never send its link to anyone, and duplicate it each time you need a live version. Because copies never inherit responses, the template stays permanently clean. Store it in a dedicated Drive folder so it is easy to find from the Drive iOS app.