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CSV guide

CSV Delimiters: Comma, Semicolon, Tab or Pipe

CSV is often used as a generic name for delimited text. Regional spreadsheet exports may use semicolons, data pipelines may use tabs or pipes, and quoted fields may contain the delimiter as ordinary text.

Detect a CSV delimiter

Try this guide’s example here

Step by step

  1. Open the file and check the detected delimiter and confidence.
  2. If the preview shows one wide column, choose comma, tab, semicolon or pipe manually.
  3. Confirm that quoted delimiter characters remain inside one field.
  4. Choose the delimiter required by the destination before exporting.

Check the result

  • Use the column count and header preview to verify that every record follows the expected shape.
  • Inspect a value that contains the delimiter inside quotes, such as a postal address or product description.
  • If a file mixes delimiters between rows, treat it as malformed input and repair the source rather than trusting a single automatic choice.

Common pitfalls

  • Splitting each physical line with String.split breaks quoted commas and multiline fields.
  • A one-column file provides too little evidence for confident delimiter detection.
  • Decimal commas and semicolon-delimited regional exports are a common source of mistakes.

Try the example on this page

Choose Try sample to load this guide’s synthetic data. Adjust the settings, inspect the result and export it here. You can also choose your own file for local processing.

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Rows0
Columns0
EncodingAuto
DelimiterAuto
Issue groups0

Open a data file to start

The parser runs off the main thread. Once loaded, you can search, sort, validate, repair and export without an account.

Original samples: semicolon.csv

Check expected outcomes and file checksums

Related CSV guides

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