CSV
Comma-Separated Values
MIME type: text/csv
CSV is a simple text format for storing tabular data where each line is a row and values are separated by commas. It's universally supported by spreadsheet applications, databases, and programming languages.
Advantages
- +Universally compatible
- +Human-readable plain text
- +Tiny file sizes
- +Easy to generate and parse programmatically
Limitations
- -No data type information (everything is text)
- -No standard for encoding or escaping
- -No support for hierarchical data
- -No formatting, formulas, or multiple sheets
Common Use Cases
Technical Details
CSV has no formal standard, though RFC 4180 provides guidelines. Fields containing commas, newlines, or double quotes are enclosed in double quotes. Double quotes within fields are escaped by doubling them. Line endings can be CRLF or LF. Character encoding is typically UTF-8 but not guaranteed. TSV (Tab-Separated Values) is a common variant using tabs instead of commas.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I convert CSV to JSON?
Paste your CSV data into BriskTool's JSON Formatter — it can parse CSV and convert it to JSON arrays or objects. Each row becomes a JSON object with column headers as keys.