--- title: "TSV to CSV" description: "Convert tab-separated exports from psql, mysql and Excel into RFC 4180 CSV, and CSV back into TSV, in your browser. Quoting is correct, values stay text, and nothing is uploaded." url: https://findutils.com/convert/tsv-to-csv/ category: convert --- # TSV to CSV Convert tab-separated exports from psql, mysql and Excel into RFC 4180 CSV, and CSV back into TSV, in your browser. Quoting is correct, values stay text, and nothing is uploaded. **Use this tool:** [TSV to CSV](https://findutils.com/convert/tsv-to-csv/) ## Programmatic access - REST id `tsv-to-csv`: POST https://api.findutils.com/api/tools/tsv-to-csv/execute (reference: https://findutils.com/api/tsv-to-csv/) - MCP tool `tsv_to_csv` on https://mcp.findutils.com (reference: https://findutils.com/mcp/tsv-to-csv/) ## Why Use Our TSV to CSV Converter? psql, mysql --batch, Excel's Text (Tab delimited) export and a copy from a spreadsheet grid all produce tab-separated text. Many upload forms and importers accept only CSV. Replacing every tab with a comma looks like the fix, and it breaks the first value that contains a comma, a quote or a line break. This page reads the TSV, including the fields Excel wrapped in quotes, and writes CSV with the RFC 4180 rule: a cell is quoted only when it needs to be, and a quote inside is doubled. The reverse direction writes TSV from CSV on the same page. Values stay text, so a part number keeps its leading zeros. Nothing is uploaded. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### Why not replace every tab with a comma? Because a value can contain a comma. Pipe, 5 inch becomes two cells and every column after it shifts by one. A value with a quote or a line break breaks the file in the same way. The CSV rule is to wrap such a value in quotes and double the inner quotes, and that is what this page does. ### Does the page also convert CSV to TSV? Yes. Flip the direction toggle, or drop a .csv file and the page switches by itself. The CSV is read per RFC 4180, so a quoted comma stays inside its value, and the cells are joined with tabs. A cell that holds a tab, a quote or a line break is quoted the way Excel's tab-delimited export quotes it. /convert/csv-to-tsv/ leads to this page. ### Are values changed in any way? No. Every value is written as text exactly as it was read. 00123 keeps its zeros, 1e5 is not turned into 100000, and 03/04/2026 is not reformatted. Only the quoting changes, and only where the separator, a quote or a line break makes it necessary. ### How does the page read a TSV that Excel exported with quotes? Excel's Text (Tab delimited) export wraps a field in quotes when the field holds a tab, a quote or a line break, and doubles the inner quotes. The page reads such a field as one value. A quote that appears inside a field that does not start with a quote, as in 5" pipe, is kept as a literal character. ### What does the uneven rows warning mean? Some rows have a different number of columns than the header. In a TSV that usually means a stray tab or a line break inside a value that was not quoted, or a trailing tab on some rows. The rows still convert; the count tells you how many to check in the source. ### Which separator should I pick for Excel? Excel follows the Windows regional settings. In a locale that uses a comma as the decimal mark, Excel expects semicolons between fields; pick Semicolon. Everywhere else pick Comma. Turn on Excel BOM if accented characters show wrongly; Google Sheets and Numbers do not need it. ### Does the page unescape mysql --batch output? No. mysql --batch writes a tab inside a value as the two characters backslash and t, and a newline as backslash and n. The page keeps them as written, because it cannot know whether a backslash in your data was an escape or a literal. Convert with --raw off in mysql if you need the characters back. ### Is my file uploaded anywhere? No. The text is parsed and rewritten in your browser, and no request carries the file. You can confirm that in the browser's network panel while converting. ### How large a file can I convert? The input cap is 5 MB for TSV and 10 MB for CSV. The conversion runs in the tab, so a file near the cap can keep the browser busy for a moment. Use Download rather than Copy for a large output. For a batch or a script, the same converters are on the FindUtils API as tsv_to_csv and csv_to_tsv. ### How do I get JSON from the result? Use CSV to NDJSON for one JSON object per line, or the JSON CSV Converter for a JSON array. Both read the CSV this page writes. CSV to SQL turns the same rows into INSERT statements. ## Related Tools - [CSV Viewer](https://findutils.com/convert/csv-viewer/) - [CSV to Excel](https://findutils.com/convert/csv-to-excel/) - [JSON to CSV](https://findutils.com/convert/json-to-csv/) - [CSV to NDJSON](https://findutils.com/convert/csv-to-ndjson/) - [CSV to SQL](https://findutils.com/convert/csv-to-sql/) - [CSV Column Extractor](https://findutils.com/convert/csv-column-extractor/) - [CSV Merger](https://findutils.com/convert/csv-merger/)