What is an option group?

You can use an option group on a form, report, or data access page to display a limited set of alternatives. An option group makes selecting a value easy because you can just click the value that you want. Only one option in an option group can be selected at a time.

In a form or report, an option group consists of a group frame and a set of check boxes, option buttons, and toggle buttons. In a data access page, an option group consists of a group frame and a set of option buttons.

If an option group is bound to a field, only the group frame itself is bound to the field, not the check boxes, toggle buttons, or option buttons inside the frame. Instead of setting the ControlSource property for each control in the option group, you set the OptionValue (form or report) or the Value (data access page) property of each check box, toggle button, or option button. In a form or report, set the control property to a number that's meaningful for the field the group frame is bound to. In a data access page, set the control property to either a number or any text that's meaningful for the field the group frame is bound to. When you select an option in an option group, Microsoft Access sets the value of the field to which the option group is bound to the value of the selected option's OptionValue or Value property.

Notes

• The OptionValue or Value property is set to a number because the value of an option group can only be a number, not text. Access stores this number in the underlying table. In this example, if you want to display the name of the shipper instead of a number in the Orders table in an Access database, you can create a separate table called Shippers that stores shipper names, and then make the ShipVia field in the Orders table a Lookup field that looks up data in the Shippers table. For more information on creating a Lookup field, click .
  
  
• In a form or report, an option group can also be set to an expression. In a form, report, or data access page, an option group can be unbound. You can use an unbound option group in a custom dialog box to accept user input and then carry out an action based on that input.