Guide
PDF to Excel
How to get a table out of a PDF and into an Excel spreadsheet, free.
Move the data into a spreadsheet now
If your PDF has selectable text (try highlighting a number with your cursor): open it, select the table, copy, and paste into Excel — then use Data → Text to Columns to split it into cells. For a cleaner structure, convert the PDF to Word first and copy the reconstructed table from there.
If your PDF is a scan: run it through OCR PDF to recognise the text, then copy it out. Expect to fix a few misread digits.
Convert the PDF to Word firstHow to Get a Table Out of a PDF and Into Excel (Free)
Financial statements, bank exports, invoices, and reports arrive as PDFs, and the numbers inside them are locked — you can't sort, total, or chart a PDF. Getting that data into Excel or Google Sheets normally means retyping it cell by cell.
A one-click PDF to Excel tool that rebuilds table structure automatically is still in development, because doing it reliably across every PDF layout is genuinely hard. But there are free ways to move the data now, and which one works best depends on whether your PDF has real text or is a scan.
How to use this tool
- 1
Check whether the PDF has real text
Try to highlight a number with your cursor. If you can, it has a text layer. If it's a flat image, it's a scan.
- 2
Text PDF: convert to Word, then copy the table
Run it through PDF to Word. Open the DOCX, select the table it rebuilt, and paste straight into Excel — Word tables paste into cells cleanly.
- 3
Scanned PDF: OCR it first
Run it through OCR PDF, open the result, copy the table text, paste into Excel, and use Data → Text to Columns to separate the values.
- 4
Clean up in the spreadsheet
Fix any merged or misaligned cells, check numbers that OCR may have misread (0/O, 1/l, 5/S), and set column formats.
Why PDF tables are hard to extract
A PDF doesn't store a table as rows and columns — it stores each number as text positioned at fixed coordinates on the page. A person sees a table; software sees scattered text fragments and has to guess where the cell boundaries are. Simple, ruled tables convert well; nested headers, merged cells, multi-line rows, and cells that wrap are where automated extraction breaks down.
Getting the cleanest result
Prefer the PDF to Word route over a raw copy-paste — Word does a real attempt at rebuilding the grid, so the paste into Excel lands in proper cells far more often.
For a scanned PDF, scan quality is everything: a straight, high-contrast 300 DPI page OCRs with very few errors; a phone photo at an angle will need more correction.
If the PDF came from a website or a system that can also export CSV or Excel directly, use that export instead — it will always beat extracting from the PDF.
The automatic tool
A dedicated PDF to Excel tool — upload a PDF, get back an .xlsx with the tables reconstructed — is on ConvertBrio's roadmap. Until it ships, the PDF to Word and OCR PDF routes above are the free way to get the data moving.
Related Tools
PDF to Excel — FAQ
Common questions about extracting PDF table data into Excel.
How do I convert a PDF table to Excel for free?
If the PDF has selectable text, convert it to Word with ConvertBrio's PDF to Word tool, then copy the reconstructed table and paste it into Excel. If it's a scan, run OCR PDF first, then copy the text and split it with Text to Columns.
Is there a one-click PDF to Excel tool on ConvertBrio?
Not yet — automatic table reconstruction is in development. The PDF to Word and OCR PDF routes are the current free options for moving the data into a spreadsheet.
Why does my pasted table land all in one column?
You pasted plain text rather than a table structure. Select the column, then use Excel's Data → Text to Columns (delimited by space, comma, or tab) to split the values into cells. Converting via PDF to Word first usually avoids this entirely.
Can I extract a table from a scanned PDF?
Yes, but run it through OCR PDF first to turn the image into recognised text. Then copy it into Excel and double-check any digits the OCR may have misread.