How do I open the CSV in Excel?

Download it and open it, or in Excel use Data, From Text/CSV and pick the file. If your Excel expects semicolons (common where the decimal separator is a comma), choose Semicolon before downloading. The download starts with a UTF-8 byte-order mark, so Excel reads accented letters correctly when you open it. Text you copy and paste has no mark; if accents look wrong after pasting it into a file, import that file through From Text/CSV and set the file origin to UTF-8.

Why do some cells start with an apostrophe?

A cell that starts with =, + or @, or with a minus followed by a letter or one of ( = + - @, could run as a formula when a spreadsheet opens the file. The converter puts an apostrophe in front of such a cell, so -A1 and +1 are written with a leading apostrophe. A plain negative number such as -5 is left alone.

What happens to repeated child elements?

Only the first one with a given name is kept in the row. If an order has three elements, the item column holds the first. To get every item, set the record path to item (or orders/order/item): each becomes its own row, although that row has no columns from its order.

Does it handle namespaces?

Yes, when the prefix is declared, as in a Google Shopping feed with xmlns:g on the root: becomes a column called g:price. A prefix that is used but never declared makes the XML invalid, and the converter shows an error instead of output.

Is there a size limit?

The Max rows field converts up to 100,000 rows, 1,000 by default, and warns when the XML has more. XML longer than 5 million characters is refused with a message. The whole document is parsed in the browser tab, so a large file can make the page slow.

XML to CSV Converter

XML to CSV: each child of the root element becomes a row, its tags become columns and attributes @ columns, with a comma, semicolon, tab or pipe delimiter. How it works

XML Input

Record path (optional)

Tag names separated by /, such as catalog/item. Each matching element becomes one row. Leave empty to use the children of the root element.

Include header row

Max rows

Click to upload or drag and drop

XML files only (.xml, .txt)

CSV output

Paste XML to convert

CSV Output

About the XML to CSV Converter

To convert XML to CSV, each child element of the root becomes one row, each tag inside it becomes a column, and each attribute becomes a column named with @. Two <person> records with <name>, <age> and <city> and an id attribute give two rows such as John Smith,30,New York,1. Nested elements are not split into their own columns: their text is joined into one cell, unless you set a Record path such as orders/order/addr, which makes every matching element a row.

How to use this tool

Paste the XML into XML Input, drop a .xml or .txt file on the upload area, or press Load Sample.
For nested XML, type a Record path such as catalog/item: each matching element becomes a row. A bare name matches at any depth, and a leading / starts at the root.
Pick the delimiter (comma, semicolon, tab or pipe) and the quote character, and choose whether to include the header row.
Check the Structure Preview: root element, data rows, columns and the column names.
Copy the CSV, or download it as a .csv file named after the root element.

Frequently asked questions

How do I open the CSV in Excel?: Download it and open it, or in Excel use Data, From Text/CSV and pick the file. If your Excel expects semicolons (common where the decimal separator is a comma), choose Semicolon before downloading. The download starts with a UTF-8 byte-order mark, so Excel reads accented letters correctly when you open it. Text you copy and paste has no mark; if accents look wrong after pasting it into a file, import that file through From Text/CSV and set the file origin to UTF-8.
Why do some cells start with an apostrophe?: A cell that starts with =, + or @, or with a minus followed by a letter or one of ( = + - @, could run as a formula when a spreadsheet opens the file. The converter puts an apostrophe in front of such a cell, so -A1 and +1 are written with a leading apostrophe. A plain negative number such as -5 is left alone.
What happens to repeated child elements?: Only the first one with a given name is kept in the row. If an order has three <item> elements, the item column holds the first. To get every item, set the record path to item (or orders/order/item): each <item> becomes its own row, although that row has no columns from its order.
Does it handle namespaces?: Yes, when the prefix is declared, as in a Google Shopping feed with xmlns:g on the root: <g:price> becomes a column called g:price. A prefix that is used but never declared makes the XML invalid, and the converter shows an error instead of output.
Is there a size limit?: The Max rows field converts up to 100,000 rows, 1,000 by default, and warns when the XML has more. XML longer than 5 million characters is refused with a message. The whole document is parsed in the browser tab, so a large file can make the page slow.

Turning XML records into a spreadsheet

Use it when an export, feed or API response arrives as XML and you need it in a spreadsheet or a database import. The sample's two <person> records become the rows John Smith,30,New York,1,true and Jane Doe,25,Los Angeles,2,false: child elements turn into columns and each record's attributes into columns named @id and @active. The header row keeps those names as they are: the formula apostrophe described below goes on values only.

Copy the CSV or download it as a .csv named after the root element. The file is read in your browser and is not uploaded.

How the XML is flattened

The root element's children are the rows. Columns are the union of every row's child element names, in order of first appearance, followed by the rows' attributes as @name. A cell holds the trimmed text of the first child with that name: repeated children keep only the first, and a child with children of its own has their text run together, unless you set a record path. A root whose children hold plain text becomes a single row.

Record path chooses the rows instead: tag names separated by /, such as catalog/item. A bare name such as item matches at any depth, and a leading / anchors the path at the root element. Rows from a record path carry no columns from their parent elements.

A row limit (default 1,000, up to 100,000) warns when rows are cut. A value is quoted only when it contains the delimiter, the quote character or a line break, and quotes inside are doubled; with quoting set to None nothing is escaped. Values starting with =, + or @, or with a minus followed by a letter or by one of ( = + - @, get a leading apostrophe so spreadsheets do not run them as formulas.

Fun Fact: An .xlsx workbook is itself a ZIP archive of XML files: rename a copy to .zip and you can open the worksheet, shared strings and styles as separate XML documents.

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