About the CSV to Excel
CSV files are plain text, so opening them in Excel can scramble accents, merge everything into one column when the separator differs, or turn product codes like 00123 into 123. This converter reads the CSV carefully, detects whether it uses commas, semicolons, tabs or pipes, shows you a preview, and saves a proper Excel .xlsx file. Numbers become real numbers you can add up, while codes with leading zeros stay as text. Paste CSV or pick a file; everything happens in your browser.
Updated October 2026
How to use the CSV to Excel
- 1Upload a CSV file or paste CSV text.
- 2Check the separator; automatic detection usually gets it right.
- 3Name the sheet and file.
- 4Look at the preview of the first rows.
- 5Download the .xlsx file.
How the separator is detected
The tool looks at the first lines and counts commas, semicolons and tabs outside quotes. The character that splits every line into the same number of columns wins. If the preview looks wrong, pick the separator yourself.
Problems this avoids
Opening a CSV directly in Excel is a common source of quiet data damage.
- Leading zeros removed from postcodes and IDs
- Long numbers turned into 1.23E+15
- Accented letters shown as é
- Everything in column A
Quotes and line breaks
CSV fields that contain the separator or a line break are wrapped in double quotes, and a quote inside a field is written twice. The converter follows these rules, so addresses with commas and notes with several lines stay in one cell.
After converting
Format the columns in Excel as you like: currency, dates or percentages. To go the other way, use Excel to CSV.
Typical CSV sources
Bank statement downloads, exports from online shops and booking systems, Google Forms responses, analytics reports and database dumps usually arrive as CSV. Converting to .xlsx before you start working keeps the data intact and lets you use filters, totals and charts straight away.
What the preview shows
The preview lists the first six rows and up to eight columns, with a note giving the full number of rows and columns found. If the column count looks too low, the separator is probably wrong; if values are split in odd places, the file may use quotes in a non-standard way.
Phone and computer
You can convert on a phone and open the .xlsx in the Excel, Sheets or Numbers app. To go back, use Excel to CSV, and when the spreadsheet should be a document, Excel to PDF does it. If the file is long, the Split Excel tool cuts it into parts, and the CSV to JSON Converter is the one for web data.
Features
- Automatic separator detection
- Comma, semicolon, tab and pipe
- Real numbers, safe leading zeros
- Quoted fields and line breaks handled
- Preview before download
- Runs in your browser
Frequently asked questions
Why does my CSV open in one column in Excel?
Excel expects the separator used in your region, often a semicolon in Europe. Converting to .xlsx removes the guesswork because each value is stored in its own cell.
Will accents and other alphabets survive?
Yes. The text is read as UTF-8 and stored in the .xlsx exactly, so é, ü, ñ and non-Latin scripts appear correctly.
Will numbers be numbers?
Plain numbers such as 42, 3.5 or 1,250.75 become numbers. Values with leading zeros, long ID numbers over 15 digits and dates stay as text so nothing is lost.
Can I paste data from another program?
Yes. Paste rows separated by tabs, for example from a web table, and choose Tab as the separator.
Is there a row limit?
Excel allows about one million rows. Very large CSV files may be slow in a browser; files of tens of thousands of rows convert in seconds.
Is my spreadsheet uploaded?
No. It is read and converted in your browser, so private figures and customer lists stay on your device.
Can I convert TSV files too?
Yes. Pick a .tsv file or choose Tab as the separator.