Fix garbled Chinese when opening a CSV in Excel

A CSV file is plain text, and Excel has to guess which encoding it uses. When it guesses wrong, Chinese, Japanese or accented characters turn into nonsense. Here is why, and how to fix it.

By 孤獨的時空旅人 · Updated 2026-10-16

Why the text looks garbled

A CSV file does not say which encoding it uses. Excel on Windows often assumes the system's legacy code page (Big5 for Traditional Chinese, GBK for Simplified Chinese, Shift-JIS for Japanese) unless the file starts with a UTF-8 byte-order mark. A UTF-8 file without that mark, or a Big5 file opened on another system, then shows wrong characters.

Fix 1: convert it to .xlsx

Open the CSV in CSV to Excel. The encoding is detected automatically (UTF-8 first, then Big5, GBK, Shift-JIS and EUC-KR); if the preview looks wrong, choose another encoding. The .xlsx file stores text in a way Excel always reads correctly, and the conversion happens in your browser.

Fix 2: import it the right way in Excel

In Excel, use Data › From Text/CSV, then choose the file origin (for example 65001: Unicode UTF-8, or Chinese Traditional Big5) in the preview before loading. When you save your own data, choose “CSV UTF-8 (Comma delimited)” so other programs can read it.

Leading zeros and long numbers

Excel removes leading zeros (007 becomes 7) and shows numbers longer than 15 digits in scientific notation, losing the digits after the 15th. IDs, phone numbers and card-like numbers should stay as text. CSV to Excel keeps such values as text, while ordinary numbers stay numbers.

Delimiters and quotes

Some regions use semicolons instead of commas, and cells containing commas or line breaks must be wrapped in quotes. The converter detects comma, semicolon, tab and pipe delimiters and handles quoted cells.

Tools used in this guide

CSV to ExcelConvert CSV to an .xlsx fileWord CounterCount characters, words and linesRemove DuplicatesDelete repeated lines, optionally sortCase ConverterUPPER, lower, Title, camelCase, snake_case

Frequently asked questions

Why does my Chinese CSV look garbled in Excel?

Excel guessed the wrong encoding. Convert the file to .xlsx and pick the right encoding in the preview.

Which encoding should I use to save CSV files?

UTF-8 is the safest. In Excel choose “CSV UTF-8 (Comma delimited)”.

Will leading zeros be kept?

Yes. Values such as 007 or 0912345678 stay as text.

Is my file uploaded?

No. It is converted in your browser.

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