Excel & CSV Extractor — xlsx, xls, csv to JSON

Convert Excel and CSV files to JSON for developers importing spreadsheet data.

Quick start

Read one row from a small, public CSV file:

{"fileUrl":"https://raw.githubusercontent.com/plotly/datasets/master/2014_usa_states.csv","maxRowsPerSheet":1}

One dataset item from this input:

{"file_name":"2014_usa_states.csv","sheet":"Sheet1","row_count":1,"columns":["Rank","State","Postal","Population"],"rows":[{"Rank":"1","State":"Alabama","Postal":"AL","Population":"4849377.0"}],"status":"success","error_reason":null}

file_name names the downloaded file; sheet is the worksheet name or Sheet1 for CSV. columns contains header names, rows contains the data, and row_count counts extracted data rows. status and error_reason report success or failure.

Limits

The file URL must be publicly downloadable. Password-protected workbooks cannot be opened. Unknown or malformed formats return an error item; files with very many rows can take longer or use more memory. maxRowsPerSheet bounds extraction, and sheetNames selects Excel sheets only.

Pricing

Pay-per-event:

Event	Price
Actor start (charged by Apify, one per GB of run memory)	$0.001
Data row extracted	$0.0001

There is no per-file fee. Example: a 5,000-row sales report = 5,000 × $0.0001 + start = $0.501.

Use from AI agents (MCP)

Connect your agent to Apify's official MCP server with an Apify token. Select the Actor tool gochujang/excel-extractor, pass the Quick start JSON as input, then retrieve its dataset items through the MCP server. No separate gateway is needed.

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Excel & CSV Extractor converts .xlsx, .xlsm, .xls, and .csv files into structured JSON — one record per sheet or one record per row in flat mode. Pass a URL or base64-encoded file to get sheet names, headers, and row data.

Spreadsheet data is locked in binary formats that no API can read directly. This actor is the extraction layer that unlocks it — turning Excel reports, exported CSVs, and supplier data files into JSON that any system can consume.

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Why use Excel & CSV Extractor?

1. AI data ingestion — Feed spreadsheet data directly into Claude, GPT, or RAG pipelines. JSON output from this actor is ready for vector embedding, tabular Q&A, or structured analysis without manual conversion.
2. ETL pipeline automation — Transform Excel reports and CSV exports into database-ready records. Trigger on new file uploads, extract the data, push to your API — fully automated with no manual steps.
3. Financial report processing — Extract P&L, balance sheet, or budget rows from multi-sheet workbooks. The sheetNames filter lets you target specific tabs without processing the entire file.
4. Supplier data import — Parse product catalogs, inventory sheets, and price lists from supplier Excel files and sync them to your e-commerce or ERP system in real time.
5. Multi-sheet workbook handling — Extract all tabs from complex workbooks in one run. Each sheet becomes a separate output record with its own sheet, row_count, columns, and rows fields.

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How to use

1. Open the actor on Apify Store and click Try for free.
2. Paste a direct URL to your .xlsx or .csv file in fileUrl (or provide fileBase64 for local files).
3. Set sheetNames to target specific tabs, or leave empty to extract all sheets.
4. Enable flatMode: true for one-record-per-row output (useful for large datasets feeding downstream systems).
5. Click Start. Returns one output record per sheet.

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Input options

Field	Type	Default	Description
fileUrl	string	—	Direct URL to .xlsx, .xlsm, or .csv file
fileBase64	string	—	Base64-encoded file content (alternative to URL)
fileName	string	auto	File name for format detection
includeHeaders	boolean	true	Treat first row as column headers
sheetNames	string[]	[] (all)	Specific sheet names to extract
maxRowsPerSheet	integer	10000	Row cap per sheet (up to 500,000)
flatMode	boolean	false	One output record per row instead of per sheet

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Output

Per-sheet output (default):

{
  "file_name": "sales-report.xlsx",
  "sheet": "Q1 Sales",
  "row_count": 842,
  "columns": ["Date", "Product", "Region", "Revenue", "Units"],
  "rows": [
    {"Date": "2026-01-03", "Product": "Widget A", "Region": "US", "Revenue": "12400", "Units": "124"},
    {"Date": "2026-01-04", "Product": "Widget B", "Region": "EU", "Revenue": "8900", "Units": "89"}
  ]
}

Flat mode (flatMode: true):

{
  "file_name": "sales-report.xlsx",
  "sheet": "Q1 Sales",
  "Date": "2026-01-03",
  "Product": "Widget A",
  "Region": "US",
  "Revenue": "12400",
  "Units": "124"
}

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Supported formats

Format	Extension	Notes
Excel (modern)	.xlsx, .xlsm	Multi-sheet, formulas evaluated
CSV / TSV	.csv, .tsv	Auto-detects encoding (UTF-8, Latin-1)

Legacy .xls: Supported through the xlrd parser. Password-protected workbooks remain unsupported.

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FAQ

Can it handle password-protected files? No — password-protected files cannot be opened without the password, and the actor has no mechanism for it. Remove password protection before uploading.

What happens with formula cells? Formulas are evaluated to their current values. The raw formula string is not included in output — you get the calculated result.

Is there a file size limit? No hard limit, but very large files (100MB+) will require longer run times. Use maxRowsPerSheet to cap output if you only need a sample.

Can it process files from Google Drive or Dropbox? Yes — supported Google Drive, Google Sheets, and Dropbox sharing URLs are resolved to direct downloads. The file must be publicly accessible.

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Related actors

• PDF Text Extractor — Extract text from PDF files (same document-to-JSON workflow)
• Web to Markdown — Convert web pages to clean text for AI pipelines
• RSS Feed Parser — Parse RSS/Atom feeds into JSON

Feedback

If this actor unlocks your spreadsheet data, a review helps others find it: Leave a review on Apify Store

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Keywords: Excel to JSON, XLSX parser, spreadsheet extractor, Excel scraper, XLSX to JSON, Excel data extraction, spreadsheet automation, ETL pipeline, Excel automation, XLS parser, Excel API, spreadsheet data, document parser