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PDF table to CSV

Get the table out of a PDF and save it as CSV: bank statement, price list or export, then carry on in Excel or any spreadsheet.

Text PDFs only, and the columns are guessedA PDF knows nothing about tables, it only holds pieces of text with coordinates. This tool finds the columns through the gaps that no row crosses. That works well for bank statements, price lists and exports; merged cells end up in one column, cells with several lines become several rows, columns without a visible gap merge into one. Numbers stay text, exactly as they appear. Scanned or photographed pages contain no text, only pictures of text: nothing comes out of those here, and this tool cannot do text recognition (OCR). Check the result before you calculate with it.

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Related: Convert PDF to text · View and clean up CSV · Convert CSV to Excel

Your file and your password never leave this device. The CSV is created in your browser and is not stored anywhere.

How it works
  1. 01Choose a PDF or drag it into the field. If the file asks for a password, type it in.
  2. 02Tap “Extract table”. The tool reads all pages and looks for the columns.
  3. 03Check the preview, pick the delimiter, save as CSV or copy it. The file is named like the PDF, just ending in .csv.

How the columns are found. First, pieces of text at the same height become rows, and in each row pieces standing close together stick into one field: a small gap is a space within the same field, a large gap is probably the next column. Then all rows with at least two fields vote on the columns: wherever none of these rows has anything, a boundary runs. A heading that runs across the whole table does not vote and is placed into the first matching column afterwards. If the table spans several pages, all pages count together: the columns have to sit in the same places on every page for that.

Where the method goes wrong. Merged cells end up in the column they overlap most. If a cell holds text across several lines, it becomes several CSV rows, and the other fields of those rows are empty. Two columns that never show a visible gap between them merge into one. Page numbers, footers and text next to the table become rows like any other: delete them in the spreadsheet. Right-aligned number columns work well because their gap is continuous.

The CSV. Fields are quoted when they contain delimiters, quotation marks or line breaks. As the delimiter, pick the semicolon for German Excel, otherwise the comma. The file starts with a marker (BOM) so Excel shows special characters correctly. If a field starts with a character a spreadsheet would read as a formula (equals sign, plus, minus, at sign), the tool puts an apostrophe in front: nothing starts calculating uninvited. Numbers stay text, exactly as they appear in the PDF, with thousands separators and currency signs; you can calculate after tidying up in the spreadsheet.

Password. If the PDF asks for a password to open, you need it: there is no guessing or cracking here. The password only goes to the PDF library in your browser and is never stored.