CSV to ICS

Schedules often start life in a spreadsheet: a class timetable, a sports league fixture list, a shift rota, a project plan or a conference programme. Typing each entry into a calendar app is slow and error-prone. This tool turns every row into a calendar event and saves them all in one .ics file that Google Calendar, Outlook and Apple Calendar import in one go.

Mapping the columns

The tool guesses which column holds the title, date, start time, end time, end date, location and description from the header names, and you can change each one. A date column may also contain the time, as in “2026-11-24 08:30”. Columns you do not need can be set to none.

Date formats

Spreadsheets write dates in many ways. Choose the order used in your file: year-month-day (2026-10-24), day-month-year (24/10/2026 or 24.10.2026) or month-day-year (10/24/2026). This matters for dates like 03/04/2026, which mean different days in different countries. Times may be written as 14:30, 2:30 PM, 7pm or 08:30:00.

Time zones and UTC

Choose the time zone the times in your spreadsheet refer to. Timed events are then saved in UTC, which every calendar app reads the same way, and each person sees the event in their own local time. Daylight saving time is handled for the exact date of each event: 09:00 in Berlin is 07:00 UTC in summer and 08:00 UTC in winter.

All-day, overnight and missing end times

Rows without a start time become all-day events, optionally spanning several days with an end date column. If the end time is earlier than the start, the event is assumed to run past midnight, such as a night shift from 22:00 to 06:00. Rows without an end time get the default length you set, one hour unless you change it.

Reminders and calendar name

A reminder adds an alert the chosen number of minutes before every event. The calendar name is used by some apps as the suggested name when you import or subscribe.

Rows that are skipped

Rows whose date or time cannot be read are skipped and listed with their row number and the problem, so you can fix them in the spreadsheet. Completely empty rows are ignored.

Importing the file

Google Calendar on a computer: Settings › Import & export › Import, then choose the target calendar. Outlook: File › Open & Export › Import/Export, or simply open the file. Apple Calendar: File › Import. On phones, opening the file from an email usually offers to add the events.

Typical schedules

A school timetable with one row per lesson and date, a football league’s fixture list, nurse or retail shift rotas, a conference agenda with rooms as locations, or a project plan with milestones as all-day events. Each can be imported by the people who need it, without anyone retyping dates.

Updating a schedule later

Calendar apps add imported events rather than replacing them. If the schedule changes, delete the calendar you imported into and import the corrected file into a fresh one.

Related tools

To go the other way, ICS to CSV exports events to a table. To check a time across zones, use the Time Zone Converter. The Online Calendar imports the .ics file too.