The faculty asks all researchers and teachers to migrate from Qualtrics to LimeSurvey. For educational purposes, the faculty will stop the use of Qualtrics as of August 1, 2026. As we understand that researchers cannot always discontinue the use of Qualtrics immediately, researchers have the opportunity to transition to LimeSurvey until December 1, 2026. We ask everyone to delete their Qualtrics data and materials by December 1, 2026, and to store them in accordance with the policy of their educational or research institute. We also would like to remind course coordinators to update their course materials.
Reason for transition
The initial reason for the faculty board to support the migration from Qualtrics to LimeSurvey was mainly driven by cost considerations. More recently, it became clear that the Data Protection Officer of Radboud University advises against the use of Qualtrics altogether, as privacy and security standards cannot be guaranteed. Given that the faculty was already in the process of migrating to LimeSurvey, the faculty board decided to no longer extend the faculty-wide Qualtrics license. LimeSurvey is offered as an alternative because it (1) is open source, (2) has been hosted by the Faculty of Social Sciences for several years, (3) offers functionalities comparable to Qualtrics, and (4) does not incur license costs.
Research part of a consortium
If research is part of a consortium for which another faculty or university is the lead partner, it is formally up to the lead partner to determine whether Qualtrics can still be used. In that case, researchers may be able to continue using Qualtrics via a guest account provided by the lead partner's faculty or university. We wish to warn researchers that other faculties or universities may decide to switch to other survey software at a later stage due to privacy and security risks.
Support available
Please reach out to limesurvey.fsw [at] ru.nl (limesurvey[dot]fsw[at]ru[dot]nl) if you need support with transitioning from Qualtrics to LimeSurvey. In addition, some workshops for teachers and researchers will be organized in the academic year of 2026-2027.
Thank you for your understanding and cooperation during this transition. We know this change may have a significant impact on your work, and we do our best to support you with the transition.
Workgroup Phase-Out of Qualtrics
Loes Pouwels
Jochem Tolsma
Pieter van Groenestijn
William van der Veld
Aniek Wols
Alphons Backx