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How to Convert a PDF Table to Excel

4 min readUpdated October 6, 2026

Retyping a table from a PDF is slow and error-prone. If the PDF contains real text (not a scan), the rows and columns can be detected from where the text sits on the page.

Convert the table

1. Open PDF to Excel and choose the PDF.
2. Check the table preview. Each page becomes its own sheet.
3. Download the .xlsx file.

Numbers stay numbers, so you can sum, sort and chart them straight away. The file is processed on your device and is not uploaded, which matters for bank statements and payroll reports.

Which PDFs convert well?

• Good: clean, regular tables such as statements, price lists and simple reports.
• Needs tidying: merged cells, tables split across columns, and text that wraps inside cells.
• Not possible: scanned pages, because they contain a picture of the table rather than text.

Clean up in the spreadsheet

Open the file in Excel, Google Sheets, LibreOffice or the free online spreadsheet:

1. Delete header and footer rows that came from the page (page numbers, bank address).
2. Check that dates were recognized as dates. If not, use Format to set the date format.
3. Add a total row with =SUM() to compare against the PDF’s own total. It is a quick way to catch a missed row.

Already have a CSV?

Some banks offer a CSV export, which is cleaner than any PDF conversion. Turn it into a formatted workbook with CSV to Excel.

Save the workbook to your workstand to keep it with the project or month it belongs to.