To import a CSV file into a Microsoft Access database, you first open or create an Access database. You can then either create a new table to import the CSV data into, or import the CSV data to create a new table. In the External Data tab, select the CSV file and choose to either append the records to an existing table or import into a new table. You then map the CSV column fields to table fields and can optionally add a primary key.

1. How to import CSV into Microsoft Access Database
1. Open or create a new database for the CSV data.
2. You may create a new table and prepare all the fields needed or you may just import the
CSV data to create the new table.
3. Go to the “External Data” tab on Microsoft Access, as shown in the Figure 1 below and
click on the “Text File”.
Figure 1
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2. 4. The “Get External Data”, Figure 2 will be shown. Select the CSV file by clicking the
“Browse” button. (*Note: the file name must be less than 64 characters otherwise
Microsoft Access will not be able to import it).
Figure 2
5. After selecting the CSV file, if you created your own table, choose the “Append a copy of
the records to the table.” option and select the table from the dropdown list. If you did
not create your own table then you will need to choose “Import the source data into a
new table in the current database.” option. After selecting the option, press “OK” to
continue.
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3. 6. Next, make sure the option “Delimited – Characters such as comma or tab separate
each field” is selected as shown in Figure 3 and click “Next”.
Figure 3
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4. 7. Next, make sure “Comma” is selected in the “Choose the delimiter that separates your
fields” and the double quotes symbol “ is selected in the “Text Qualifier” as shown in
Figure 4 and click “Next” to continue.
*Note: Users who created their own table with their own field names may skip the rest and
click “Next” or “Finish” to complete the import in step 7.
Figure 4
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5. 8. In this window (Figure 5), choose the field and type in the field name for each of the
column for the CSV data and click “Next” to proceed.
Figure 5
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6. 9. In this step, you may choose to add a primary key to the table, choose a field as a
primary key or no primary key for the table. Adding a primary key to the table will add
another column on the left, choosing a field as a primary key will let users to choose a
field from the dropdown list as the primary key. You will have to choose based on how
you use the table. After selecting your option, click “Next” or “Finish” to complete the
import.
Figure 6
10. Done.
Notes: We are using Microsoft Access 2010 to demonstrate the step-by-step guideline. Some variants in screen capture and
step may be observed for other Access version.
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