# Capture partial submissions

> Keep what people typed even when they never press Submit, and see it in the Partial tab.

A partial submission is what someone typed into your form before they gave up. Switch on **Capture partial submissions** in your form's **Settings** and Maxforms saves their answers as they type, so a half-finished response still reaches you instead of disappearing. Partial capture is a **Pro** feature.

## Turn it on for a form

1. Open your form and select the **Settings** tab.
2. Scroll to the **Access** section.
3. Switch on **Capture partial submissions**.
4. Select **Save changes**.

![The Capture partial submissions switch in the Access section of a form's settings](/docs-assets/submissions/partial-submissions-1.png)

The switch is off on every new form, and you turn it on per form — enabling it on one form doesn't enable it everywhere.

## What gets saved, and when

Answers are saved about a second and a half after someone stops typing, and again whenever they change an answer. Nobody has to press anything and nothing appears on the form — as far as your respondent is concerned, nothing happened.

Maxforms keeps the answers to your text, long-text, email, phone, link, number, date, time, choice, and currency questions, plus which question the person reached before they stopped. It deliberately does **not** keep **File Upload**, **Signature**, or **Address** answers, and it never keeps card or payment details.

Capture only works on a form that's published and accepting responses, and only for questions that are visible to that person — an answer to a question your [conditional logic](/building-forms/conditional-logic) is currently hiding isn't stored.

## Read them in the Partial tab

Open the **Submissions** tab and select **Partial**. Each row is one person who started your form, with a column for each question they could have answered, plus **Last activity** and **Started**.

![The Partial tab of the Submissions view, listing one unfinished response](/docs-assets/submissions/partial-submissions-2.png)

Use the search box to find a partial by its content, and the filter and column controls to shape the table the same way you do in the **Inbox**. Deleting is the only thing you can do to a partial: the row's **Actions** menu has a single **Delete**, and you can tick several rows and remove them together.

## When a partial becomes a real submission

The moment that person presses **Submit**, their answers land in the **Inbox** as a normal submission and their partial row disappears. You never get both — a partial only exists while the response is unfinished, so the number on the **Partial** tab is a live count of people who are still stuck or already gone.

Someone who comes back to your form on the same browser picks up where they left off, with their earlier answers already filled in.

## Partials don't trigger anything

A partial submission is a private record for you. It doesn't send you the new-submission email, doesn't run any of your [integrations](/notifications-integrations), doesn't post to Slack or a webhook, and doesn't count toward your plan's monthly response limit. Nothing happens on your respondent's side either — following up with them is your call.

## If the Partial tab is empty

Check the three things capture needs, in this order:

1. **Your plan.** Partial capture is a Pro feature. On the Free plan the **Partial** tab is there but stays empty, and the **Capture partial submissions** switch in **Settings** can't be turned on.
2. **The switch.** It's off by default on every form, including forms you created before you upgraded.
3. **The form is live.** Answers are only captured on a published form that's still accepting responses — a draft or a closed form captures nothing.

## If a partial you saw yesterday is gone

Partials are kept for **30 days** from the last time that person typed something, then deleted automatically. That window is deliberate: an abandoned response is a follow-up opportunity, not a permanent record. If you need to keep one, copy the answers out before it ages out — partials don't go to the [Trash](/submissions/trash-and-recovery) and can't be recovered afterwards.