Couldn't update questions

If you see a toast in the Choice Eliminator sidebar that reads "Couldn't update N question(s)", it means Choice Eliminator tried to update the choices on one of your questions but Google Forms rejected the change. Common causes are per-option branching ("Go to section based on answer"), quiz answer keys, and response validation rules.

The good news: nothing is broken. Your form responses are safe, and the rest of your Choice Eliminator settings continue to work. You just need to remove the conflicting setting from the affected question, then re-apply your limits.

Why this happens

Choice Eliminator applies limits by replacing the question's choice list with a smaller, filtered list (excluding choices that have hit their limit). When a question has extra structure attached to specific options — like branching that routes users to a different section based on what they pick — Google Forms refuses to rewrite the choices, because doing so would silently destroy that structure.

Rather than overwrite your form without asking, Choice Eliminator skips the update and shows you this toast so you can decide how to handle it.

How to fix it

1. Open the form in Google Forms (forms.google.com).
2. Identify the affected question. If you're not sure which one, the toast tells you how many are stuck — usually it's the question you most recently configured limits for.
3. Check for per-option branching:
   • Click the question.
   • Click the ⋮ (three-dot menu) at the bottom-right of the question card.
   • If "Go to section based on answer" is checked, you have option-level branching.
   • To keep using Choice Eliminator on this question, uncheck it. (If you want to preserve some routing, configure it at the section level instead, using a page break.)
4. Check for quiz answer keys (only relevant if your form is a quiz):
   • In the form's Settings tab, see if Quizzes → Make this a quiz is on.
   • If yes, either turn it off, or click into the affected question, click Answer key at the bottom-left, and remove the correct-answer marking.
5. Check for response validation:
   • Click the question.
   • Click the ⋮ menu.
   • If "Response validation" is shown, click it and remove the rule.
6. Return to Choice Eliminator in the sidebar.
7. Click Apply on your choice limits again.

The toast will not reappear; the affected questions will be unstuck.

What if I want to keep the branching?

Per-option branching and Choice Eliminator are fundamentally incompatible — choice elimination removes options as they're picked, and branching needs the options to stay put so the routing rules can fire.

If branching is essential to your form, you have two options:

• Drop the limit on that question. Open Choice Eliminator and toggle off the limit for the affected question. The rest of your settings keep working.
• Move the branching to the section level. Add a page break after the question, and route at the page break instead of at each option. Choice Eliminator can then operate freely on the question's options.

I don't see any of these settings

If you can't find branching, quiz, or validation on the affected question, the conflict might be something we haven't documented yet. Please reach out to support with your form's edit URL and we'll take a look — finding the cause helps us improve this page.

Contact support