Web surveys are increasingly becoming an important part of the survey industry worldwide. Their use presents a promising solution in many cases, especially when surveying populations with high Internet penetration. This is due to relatively low costs, speed of data collection and ease of implementation of the survey project. Especially the latter is enabled by using special software applications for preparation and implementation of web surveys. They offer a variety of features for designing online questionnaires, recruitment of the respondents, sample management, data collection and storage. Usage of these tools requires no programming skills or in-depth computer knowledge, mainly thanks to graphical user interfaces available in the vast majority of them. There are currently more than 300 web survey software products available on the market. However, availability of different features varies significantly among them. Some of these products allow implementation of simple daily polls with only one or a few questions. On the other hand, there are applications that enable creation of long and complex survey projects, consisting of a large number of questions, branching logic, multimedia elements and other advanced features. Usage of these features also raises several methodological considerations which should be taken into account during the preparation of a survey project. All this, along with significant differences in costs and pricing schemes, makes it difficult to decide on the right software application for specific needs of an individual researcher or a research organization.

Our paper discusses the most important features of software tools for web surveys and provides an overview of the tools on the market. A random sample of software tools from the WebSM database (http://www.websm.org) was evaluated and the differences between free of charge and commercial tools are presented. It is shown that more expensive tools allow higher flexibility and better functionality in implementing a web survey project. In addition, some criteria that can help researchers choose the most appropriate application for their needs are proposed.