Click the floating AI button in the bottom-right corner of formbase. On desktop it opens a docked panel. On mobile it slides up as a drawer. The panel stays open while you work.
AI chat is available everywhere: your workspace, the form editor, the submissions page, and the translation editor. Tools and suggested prompts change based on the page you're on. You need a signed-in account — AI chat is off while you are trying formbase as a guest.
> 💡 **Think out loud** >> Vague prompts work too. Try "Help me create a form" and AI will ask follow-up questions until it has what it needs. >
Describe what you need and AI builds the fields, pages, validation, and logic directly into your form. AI sees your form's current state, so follow-ups are context-aware. For prompt-writing tips and examples, see AI form generation.
Attach an image, PDF, or screenshot to your message and AI turns it into a structured form. Great for converting paper forms, competitor screenshots, or wireframes. See AI form generation for supported formats and limits.
On the submissions page, AI reads your response data and answers questions in plain English. Suggested prompts appear automatically:
In the translation editor, AI offers context-aware quick actions: translate all missing entries, refresh outdated ones, polish existing translations, or spot-check for issues. You can translate into several languages at once. See{' '} translating form content for the full workflow.
AI handles workspace tasks too: create forms, organize folders, publish or unpublish forms, send and track requests, and set up share links — all through conversation.
Skills are reusable instructions and domain knowledge you give AI — a specific role, industry terminology, or writing style. Attach them to a message from the brain icon in the chat toolbar. Pro feature. See AI skills.
Some actions need your approval before AI runs them: publishing or unpublishing a form, deleting a form or a folder, changing a share link, canceling a request, and deleting a language from a form's translations. You'll see the proposed action with{' '} Approve and Deny buttons. Nothing changes until you confirm.
formbase runs AI chat on two Claude models. Pick one from the model button in the chat input toolbar — it shows the current model and opens a short list when you click it. The choice applies to the current conversation. New conversations start on the default.
> 💡 **Build with Haiku, analyze with Sonnet** >> Haiku is the right choice for building forms — it handles generation and edits well. Switch to Sonnet for submission analytics and tasks > that need deeper reasoning. Sonnet is more capable but costs exactly three times as much per token — see{' '} > AI credits & usage. >
Click the gear icon in the AI chat header to open AI settings, which slide in as a drawer from the right. These control how AI generates forms and are per-user — each team member tunes their own preferences. Changes apply to all future conversations.
AI always replies in your dashboard language — the interface language you pick from the language switcher in formbase's sidebar. To get a one-off result in another language, just ask in your message (for example, "reply in French").
New chat in the panel header clears the conversation and starts fresh — useful when AI has drifted off course or you move to an unrelated task. It asks you to confirm first, and the cleared history cannot be recovered. Minimize hides the panel without losing the conversation.
AI chat uses credits from your balance. The bar above the message box shows how many you have left, and turns red when you fall to 10 credits or fewer. At 0 credits, AI chat stops until you add funds. See AI credits & usage for pricing, packages, and how to add funds.
Open the AI chat panel and describe the form you want. formbase turns your prompt into a structured form with pages, fields, types, validation, helper text, and branching logic. The result is fully editable like any form you build by hand.
AI can create a brand-new form or add to one you already have open.
Be specific about purpose, audience, and required fields. Mention payment, file uploads, and logic explicitly.
``` Job application for a senior backend role. Collect name, email, country (dropdown), years of experience, GitHub URL, resume PDF upload (required), cover letter (optional, long text), and ask if they need visa sponsorship — show a follow-up question if yes. ``` ``` RSVP form for a 50-person dinner. Ask name, email, party size (1–4), dietary restrictions (multi-select: vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, none), and a free-text field for special requests. ``` > 💡 **Short prompts work too** >> Try "Help me create a form" and AI asks follow-up questions. But the more detail you give upfront, the better the first draft. >
Attach an image, PDF, or screenshot to your message and AI converts it into a structured form. This works well for paper forms, competitor screenshots, or wireframes.
AI reads the layout and fields from your file, then builds matching questions in formbase. Review the result and refine with follow-up messages.
> 💡 **Dense PDFs** >> Switch to Claude Sonnet 4.5 from the model button before sending a long or densely laid out PDF — it reads complex documents more > reliably. See choosing a model. >
After generation, keep chatting to iterate. AI sees your form's current state, so every follow-up is context-aware. You can also edit fields directly in the editor between messages.
For the full list of what AI chat can do beyond generation — translations, submissions analysis, workspace management — see{' '} Using AI.
Form generation spends credits based on prompt length and form complexity. Attachments count too — a PDF is a lot of text. See{' '} AI credits & usage for pricing and packages.
> AI Skills comes with Pro and Business. The gate is on the workspace owner's plan: when the owner has Pro or Business, > every member of that workspace can create and use skills, with no subscription of their own. See{' '} > plans & pricing. >
A skill is a set of instructions that AI follows when you attach it to a message. Think of it as giving AI a specific role, domain knowledge, or communication style for that request.
Skills are optional. AI works without them. But when you need AI to understand your industry, ask the right questions, or write in a specific tone — skills make that repeatable without re-explaining every time.
If your forms deal with a specific field — healthcare, legal, education, real estate — teach AI the terminology, regulations, and practices it should follow. A medical intake skill can name the consent language you always need; a real estate skill can list disclosure requirements by region.
Write down your house rules so every form AI builds follows them: always include a consent checkbox, split anything over 10 fields across pages, use 5-point Likert scales, start with contact info.
When AI asks clarifying questions before building a form, a skill can steer what it asks about — event type, audience size, dietary needs and budget before a registration form, say.
Control how AI writes labels, descriptions, and help text: friendly ("What's your email?"), formal ("Please provide your date of birth"), or bilingual with both English and Spanish on every label.
When you use AI to analyze submissions, a skill can tell it what matters: your NPS scoring tiers, or what makes a lead hot rather than cold.
Changes save automatically as you type — the drawer says so under its title. Click Close when you're done.
> 💡 **Be specific in your instructions** >> The more concrete your skill, the better AI follows it. Instead of "be professional", write "use formal labels like 'Full Name' not > 'What's your name?', always include placeholder text, and add validation messages." >
> Attached skills are sent with the message you write next, and the picker clears afterwards. They are not switched on for the rest of the > conversation. If a follow-up needs the same skill, attach it again before sending. >
Short description: Use when building patient intake or medical history forms.
Full description:
Short description: Use for quick user research and product feedback forms.
Full description:
Short description: Use when analyzing lead capture form submissions.
Full description:
Skills belong to the workspace, not to you. Any member can create, edit, or delete any skill, and any member can attach skills in their own AI chat. Each skill shows who created it. Set them up once and the whole team benefits.
Skills do not follow you between workspaces — each workspace keeps its own set — and deleting a workspace deletes its skills with it. Deleting a skill takes it away from everyone immediately.
> ℹ️ **Not available over MCP** >> Workspace skills are a feature of the built-in AI chat. An AI tool connected through the MCP server{' '} > cannot read them — the "skills" it can load there are formbase's own built-in reference guides. >
Every AI action — generating a form, analyzing submissions, translating content — spends credits based on the amount of text processed. Longer conversations and more complex forms cost more. The sidebar shows roughly how many chats you have left, the AI chat panel shows your exact credit balance, and the AI Usage page shows it with the credit packs you can buy.
Translating an individual submission also spends AI credits. formbase translates only eligible prose answers and caches the result for that target language, so switching between original and translated views does not spend credits again.
Credits come only from the packs you buy, and they work the same on every plan. No plan includes credits: Free, Pro, and Business all top up the same way. See Credit packages below.
formbase runs AI features on AWS Bedrock models. Credit costs are based on the model provider's token pricing — see{' '} AWS Bedrock pricing — with a 2× markup over the provider rate to cover infrastructure, payment processing, and ongoing improvements. You pay for what you use — shorter conversations cost less.
formbase also caches the context the AI re-reads on every step — your form structure and the tools the AI can use. Cached context is billed at a tenth of the normal rate, so multi-step tasks and follow-up messages in the same chat cost far less than the raw amount of text suggests. This is automatic — you do not need to do anything.
Cost also depends on the model you pick for the conversation. Claude Haiku 4.5 (the default) is the most economical and the right choice for building forms. Claude Sonnet 4.5 is more capable but costs exactly three times as much per token, so reach for it on analytics and complex thinking.
Credits are shown as whole numbers. As a reference, 100 credits = $1 of AI usage.
These are guides, not prices: what a conversation actually costs depends on its length and the number of tools AI uses. The "chats left" figure in the sidebar assumes a typical chat at ~5 credits.
Credits are one-time purchases — no recurring charge. Buy what you need, and the balance stays until you use it.
Conversation estimates are based on a typical chat costing ~5 credits. Simple prompts stretch further; complex multi-step tasks use more.
Each package grants a fixed number of credits. At checkout you pay a set price in your local currency — USD, EUR, NOK, or TRY — and the credit amount you receive is the same in every currency. Prices exclude tax.
> ℹ️ **Pricing may change** >> Credit costs are tied to underlying model provider pricing. If provider rates change, your per-conversation cost may shift. Purchased > credits never expire and keep their value (100 credits = $1 of AI usage). >
Your plan does not change how credits work. Every plan buys the same packs at the same prices, and no plan adds credits on renewal. Plans differ in AI features: AI Skills needs Pro or Business, and on Business the workspace owner can share their credits with members (see Shared workspace credits).
> If your workspace uses shared Business credits, only the workspace owner can top up the pool. Purchases you make go to your personal > balance, not the pool. >
The credits row in the sidebar summarizes the state of your balance:
The AI chat panel shows your exact balance on the bar above the message box — "N credits remaining". The ring beside it turns red once you fall to 10 credits or fewer. At 0 credits, AI chat is unavailable until you add funds.
The AI Usage page shows the same balance in a ring, with an estimate of how many chats it covers.
Members of a Business workspace with shared credits turned on see "N of [owner]'s shared credits left" in the AI chat instead of their own balance. The AI Usage page still shows their personal balance.
By default, AI credits are per-user, not per-workspace. Each person has their own balance, buys their own credits, and their usage is independent — even in a shared workspace.
On a Business plan, the workspace owner can turn on Share my AI credits with members under AI credits in Workspace Settings. Sharing is off by default and set per workspace. With sharing on, members' AI usage in that workspace bills the owner's balance instead of their own — members see "N of [owner]'s shared credits left" in the AI chat, and their personal balances stay untouched.
If the pool runs out, members' AI use in that workspace is blocked until the owner adds credits — members' own credits are never used as a fallback. Only the owner can top up the pool. If the owner's plan drops below Business, sharing stops automatically and everyone bills their own balance again.
Actions performed through the MCP server are direct API operations. They do not spend your formbase AI credits. You pay for the AI assistant (Claude, Cursor, and so on) through that service's own pricing.