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Extract Excel formulas

List every formula in a workbook with its sheet and cell, to audit or document it. Reads Excel (XLSX, XLSM), OpenDocument (ODS) and Apple Numbers, in any language — a French SI() or a German WENN() comes out as written. XLS and XLSB carry formulas that this reader cannot always surface, and CSV or TSV hold none by design: they store results, never formulas.

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Related tools

All Spreadsheets tools →
Convert formulas to valuesReplaces every formula by the result Excel last saved with it, so the sheet keeps its numbers but no longer shows how they were obtained — useful before sending a file out. Nothing is recalculated: a workbook saved without cached results comes back empty. Works with Excel (XLSX, XLS, XLSM, XLSB), OpenDocument (ODS), Apple Numbers, CSV and TSV — though CSV and TSV never hold formulas to begin with.CSV to ExcelConvert a CSV file (or pasted CSV) into a real .xlsx spreadsheet.Excel to CSVConvert an .xlsx or .xls sheet to CSV, pick which sheet.Merge Excel filesCombine several workbooks into one, keeping every sheet and renaming on collision.Split an Excel fileBreak a workbook into one .xlsx file per sheet, downloaded separately.Excel to HTML tableConvert a sheet into an HTML table you can paste straight into a page.Excel to JSONTurn a spreadsheet into a JSON array of objects, one per row, using the header row as keys.Excel to TSVExport a sheet as tab-separated values, the safe choice when your data contains commas.

Extract Excel formulas works straight from this page — free, instant, nothing to install. It covers XLSX, XLSM — adjust any of them and the result follows immediately.

How to use it

  1. Open the tool — no signup or install needed.
  2. Enter your input or adjust the available options.
  3. Get your result instantly, then copy or download it.

Frequently asked questions

What does Extract Excel formulas do?

List every formula in a workbook with its sheet and cell, to audit or document it. Reads Excel (XLSX, XLSM), OpenDocument (ODS) and Apple Numbers, in any language — a French SI() or a German WENN() comes out as written. XLS and XLSB carry formulas that this reader cannot always surface, and CSV or TSV hold none by design: they store results, never formulas.

What does it take into account?

It factors in XLSX, XLSM. Change any of them and the output follows immediately.

When would I actually use this?

Getting a table out of a workbook and into something else — JSON for an API, CSV for an import, HTML for a page — opening a file whose software you do not have, and cleaning a sheet before you hand it on.

What is the most common mistake?

Expecting the formula to survive the trip. A converted file carries the last value the spreadsheet computed, not the calculation behind it — and a workbook written by a program can carry the formula with no cached value at all, which most readers discard along with the cell.

How is Extract Excel formulas different from Convert formulas to values?

They sit next to each other but answer different questions: Convert formulas to values is the one to open when you need it to replaces every formula by the result Excel last saved with it, so the sheet keeps its numbers but no longer shows how they were obtained — useful before sending a file out. Nothing is recalculated: a workbook saved without cached results comes back empty. Works with Excel (XLSX, XLS, XLSM, XLSB), OpenDocument (ODS), Apple Numbers, CSV and TSV — though CSV and TSV never hold formulas to begin with. Pick whichever matches what you're starting from — both are free.

Is there a tool for the next step?

CSV to Excel is the closest one after this: Convert a CSV file (or pasted CSV) into a real .xlsx spreadsheet.

What else is worth having open alongside it?

Excel to CSV and Merge Excel files — they come up in the same task often enough to be worth a second tab.

Where do the figures come from?

Nothing leaves the browser. An .xlsx and an .ods are both zipped XML, read here against their published specifications. Dates are the fragile part — a spreadsheet date is a number counted from an epoch the workbook itself declares, so the same 45000 is two different days depending on a flag most files never show you.

Further reading

All guides →
ExplainerConverting Formulas to Values Keeps the Cached Answer, Not the CalculationA spreadsheet file stores both the formula and the last answer Excel computed. Stripping the formula leaves the stored answer — and leaves a blank wherever the file never carried one.ExplainerWhy Your CSV Breaks Accents and Dates in ExcelThree completely different faults hide behind the same sentence. One is the encoding, one is the separator, one is Excel guessing at types while it opens the file — and the fix for each is different. Here is how to tell them apart in five seconds.ExplainerThe Number 1 and the Text "1" Are Not DuplicatesDeduplication compares whole rows exactly, cell type included. Five identical-looking rows came out as three, because one held a number, one a string and one a string with a leading space.ComparisonXLS, XLSX, XLSM and XLSB: Which Is Which, and Which You WantFour extensions, three of them the same box with different lids. Rename an XLSX to .zip and it opens — that single fact explains the whole family, and explains why XLS, which does not, is the one still causing trouble.ExplainerSemicolon, Tab, Pipe: Choosing a Delimiter That Survives the TripWhy the reader's language decides the delimiter, what the converter does to the quoting when you switch, what the sep= first line really is, and the count of quoted cells on the same export written five ways.ComparisonZIP or TAR: Which One, and Why It MattersOne structural difference explains everything else: TAR does not compress, it only stacks; ZIP compresses each file on its own. Measured on 60 small source files, that is the difference between 1,809 bytes and 14,686.