Poll Everywhere
Depends
Confidence: Medium
Buy it if you run live lectures, trainings, or events and want real-time audience response inside PowerPoint or Teams.
Comparison
Poll Everywhere vs Top Hat
Poll Everywhere and Top Hat both land on Depends.
Top Hat
Depends
Confidence: Medium
Buy if you run large interactive lecture courses with institutional budget and campus IT/pedagogy support.
| Compare | Poll Everywhere | Top Hat |
|---|---|---|
| Verdict | Depends | Depends |
| Best for | Professors running large lectures | Large lecture courses |
| Who it's not for | Async surveys and forms . use free tools | Small classes or solo tutors . overkill |
| Privacy | No known public vulnerabilities found in the sources reviewed.⁵ | No known public vulnerabilities found in the sources reviewed. |
| Support quality | No support-quality evidence found | No support-quality evidence found |
| Public sentiment | Individual presenters and professors praise it for live engagement, though some organizations report switching away.⁹ | Reviews split sharply: universities praise the engagement feature set while professors on Reddit warn against adopting it and students resent per-term fees. |
| Biggest gotcha | Annual billing is standard; third-party analysis flags pricing escalation concerns12 | Costs fall on students each term, purchased directly through Top Hat |
Pick Poll Everywhere when
- Professors running large lectures
- Corporate trainers and facilitators
- Event presenters wanting live audience response
- Teams presenting from PowerPoint or Teams
When Poll Everywhere is not a fit
- Async surveys and forms . use free tools
- Occasional pollers unwilling to pay
- Buyers needing month-to-month billing only
- Classrooms already standardized on Top Hat
Pick Top Hat when
- Large lecture courses
- Interactive e-textbook adopters
- Universities standardizing engagement tools
- Attendance plus polling at scale
When Top Hat is not a fit
- Small classes or solo tutors . overkill
- Budget-sensitive students buying their own license
- Anyone wanting plain free polling
- Schools without onboarding support resources
Sources
- Poll Everywhere homepagepolleverywhere.comofficial
- Business & non-profit planspolleverywhere.comofficial
- Events pricing planspolleverywhere.comofficial
- Education planspolleverywhere.comofficial
- Poll Everywhere security pagepolleverywhere.comsecurity
- Nudge Security profilenudgesecurity.comsecurity
- MIT Sloan EdTech quick start guidemitsloanedtech.mit.edureview
- UVA Learning Tech reviewlearningtech.virginia.edureview
- App Store reviewsapps.apple.comreview
review
- r/Professors polling software threadreddit.comreview
- Airframe pricing/usage analysisairframe.ainews
- Poll Everywhere vs Slido comparisonpolleverywhere.comofficial
- Poll Everywhere vs Mentimeter comparisonpolleverywhere.comofficial
- Top Hat homepagetophat.comofficial
- Top Hat pricingtophat.comofficial