Excel Connectors

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ODBC

Excel ODBC Driver

Read, write, and update Excel through ODBC

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Other Microsoft Excel Technologies

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The Excel ODBC Driver is a powerful tool that allows you to connect with live data from Excel, directly from any applications that support ODBC connectivity. Access Excel data like you would a database - read, write, and update Excel data through a standard ODBC Driver interface.

Excel

See what you can do with Excel ODBC Driver

Server

SQL Server Linked-Server

Connect to Excel from SQL Server as Linked-Server. You can query Excel from familiar Transact-SQL without need of setting up another application.

Data Integration & ETL

Integrate Excel to your system through popular ETL / EAI tools such as Informatica PowerCenter. Standard SQL and Stored Procedures enable fast delivery of your integration projects.

Reporting & BI

Connect Excel from any ODBC compatible tools:

Desktop

MS Access / Excel / PowerQuery

Your familiar tools can connect to Excel using CData ODBC.

Microsoft Access
Power Query
DBeaver
and more

Excel ODBC Connectivity Features

Access Excel data either as an entire worksheet or from discrete ranges of data within a worksheet
Represent discrete blocks of data as tables through automatic detection or by manually specifying ranges of data
Optionally specify if the first row of data should be used for field names
Read tables that are oriented horizontally or vertically
Support for Excel XLSX file format, 2007 and above
Connect to live Microsoft Excel data, for real-time data access with the Microsoft Excel ODBC Driver
Full support for data aggregation and complex JOINs in SQL queries
Secure connectivity through modern cryptography, including TLS 1.2, SHA-256, ECC, etc.
Generate table schema automatically based on existing Microsoft Excel data or manually for greater control of the content you need
Seamless integration with leading BI, reporting, and ETL tools and with custom applications via the Excel Connector.

Target Service, API

The ODBC driver can connect with data on Microsoft Excel. The Excel file can be the ones on your local machine. We also support Excel files stored on a remote environment such as Amazon S3, Azure Blob Storage, Azure Data Lake Storage Gen1, Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2, Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 SSL, Azure Files, Box, Dropbox, FTP, FTPS, Google Cloud Storage, Google Drive, HDFS, HDFS Secure, HTTP, HTTPS, IBM Object Storage Source, OneDrive, OneLake, Oracle Cloud Storage, SFTP, or SharePoint.

Schema, Data Model

CData Microsoft Excel ODBC Driver supports the Office Open XML+ spreadsheets used by Microsoft Excel 2007 and later. currently supports .xlsx and .xlsm files. However, only read operations are supported for .xlsm files. Modifying data operations for .xlsm may cause loss of or damage to macros.

Key Objects

The ODBC Driver for Microsoft Excel allows you to manipulate Excel files in a variety of ways. The driver supports reading data vertically and horizontally as well as from user-defined ranges and named ranges. Refer to Selecting Data and Modifying Data for examples of different ways of querying and modifying spreadsheet data.

Operations

SELECT operations with filtering and JOINS are supported.

Supports UPDATE, INSERT, and DELETE operations for local Excel file. For Excel files stored on remote storage, only SELECT operations are supported.

Authentication

The driver supports multiple AuthScheme required to securely connect to Excel files in various remote services.

Specific feature or properties

AggregateFiles, Null handling, Formula handling, Recalculate, data type detection and many strong feature to deal with Excel data.

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Excel ODBC Driver Download

Robust ODBC access to Microsoft Excel

Full-featured and consistent SQL access to any supported data source through ODBC

Standards-Compliant ODBC

ODBC 3.8 compliant native protocol based drivers.
Unicode, 32-bit and 64-bit support

Support 32-bit and 64-bit applications and unicode ODBC APIs.
Cross-platform ODBC (Windows/Linux/Mac)

Available for Microsoft Windows, Unix, and Mac (macOS / OS X) platforms.
Certified ODBC Compatibility*

Our drivers undergo extensive testing and are certified to be compatible with leading analytics and reporting applications like Tableau, Microsoft Excel, and many more.
* Please visit our knowledge base to access how-to articles.
Embedded Remoting Capabilities

Our exclusive Remoting feature allows hosting the ODBC connection on a server to enable connections from various clients on any platform (Java, .NET, C++, PHP, Python, etc.), using any standards based technology (ODBC, JDBC, etc.). ODBC Remoting is enabled using the popular MySQL and SQL (TDS) wire protocol server.

String, Date, Numeric SQL Functions

The driver includes a library of 50 plus functions that can manipulate column values into the desired result. Popular examples include Regex, JSON, and XML processing functions.
Collaborative Query Processing

Our drivers enhance the data source's capabilities by additional client-side processing, when needed, to enable analytic summaries of data such as SUM, AVG, MAX, MIN, etc.
Easily Customizable and Configurable

The data model exposed by our ODBC Drivers can easily be customized to add or remove tables/columns, change data types, etc. without requiring a new build. These customizations are supported at runtime using human-readable schema files that are easy to edit.
Enterprise-class Secure Connectivity

Includes standard Enterprise-class security features such as TLS/ SSL data encryption for all client-server communications.
Replication and Caching

Our replication and caching commands make it easy to copy data to local and cloud data stores such as Oracle, SQL Server, Google Cloud SQL, etc. The replication commands include many features that allow for intelligent incremental updates to cached data.

Connect to Excel—empower every team

Management & data consumer
- Easiest way to connect to Excel
- Dashboard / Reports that connect with Excel
- Data drives business, but IT teams are overwhelmed by accessing numerous siloed sources like Excel. CData ODBC Drivers offer the fastest, easiest way to connect Excel to BI tools like SAP BusinessObjects, Crystal Reports, Qlik, or Access.
IT Department
Integrate Excel to your system:
- Custom application integration with SQL
- SQL Server Linked Server
- Informatica PowerCenter
Need to integrate your internal systems with Excel? CData ODBC Drivers let you do it easily—access Excel as a SQL Server Linked Server or connect via tools like Informatica PowerCenter using an SQL-based driver, no extra middleware required.
IT Pro, Infrastructure
- Data Client of your choice
- Excel, MS Access Linked-table, PowerQuery
Still exporting and importing CSVs manually or with scripts? CData ODBC Drivers give you live access to Excel—no middleware or files needed. Use your preferred tools and stay in control of your Excel data.

AI-assisted development with CData CLI

Build Excel integrations faster with AI that understands your schema

Schema-aware AI

CData CLI gives AI coding tools access to your Excel schema. No more guessing table names or column types—AI sees the same metadata in your ODBC Drivers.

Your AI Knows SQL

How to find table names, column names, and how to generate SQL syntax are things that AI knows well from millions of training data. No need for customization, no hallucinations. Your AI acts like a domain specialist to Excel.

More Accurate, More Token-Efficient

With CData CLI's queryable schema detection and highly efficient queries with filters, aggregation, joins with correct pushdown, your AI will achieve more accuracy with less token usage.

Supported AI Coding Tools

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FAQs

Frequently asked Excel ODBC driver questions

Learn more about Excel ODBC drivers for data and analytics integration

Does Excel support ODBC?
Not natively. However, CData offers an ODBC driver for Excel that allows you to connect to Excel data from any ODBC-compliant application, just like you would access a traditional database. This can be useful for tasks like:
- Accessing Excel from applications: Connect to Excel data in popular tools and applications including Microsoft Excel, Tableau, Power BI, and many others.
- Real-time data: You can work with live Excel data within these applications, enabling tasks like reporting and analysis.
- Connecting systems: Build data integrations between Excel and other systems.
The Excel ODBC driver is an ODBC 3.8 compliant native protocol-based driver with comprehensive ANSI SQL-92 support. This means that virtually any application that can connect to data via ODBC, can use the CData ODBC driver for real-time integration. Download a fully functional free trial of the Excel ODBC driver today to get started.
Is there an ODBC driver for Excel?

Yes, the CData ODBC driver for Excel provides universal ODBC data connectivity for Excel. The Excel ODBC driver offers a simple SQL-based layer of abstraction that simplifies real-time data access for users and applications, enabling them to communicate with Excel using a standardized set of functions. Virtually any application on any platform (including Windows, macOS, or *nix) can use the CData ODBC driver for real-time integration.
How do I connect to Excel via ODBC?

Connectivity to Excel via ODBC is easy. First, download and install the Excel ODBC driver. The download page includes separate installers for Windows, macOS, and Unix, so please select the Excel ODBC driver that matches the platform where you intend to use the driver.

Once the installation is complete, navigate to the ODBC driver documentation page. Here, you'll find a wealth of information about the installed driver. The step-by-step instructions for creating a DSN and using it to connect to Excel via ODBC are just the beginning. The documentation also provides extensive configuration details for using the Excel ODBC driver with all your favorite applications and development tools, ensuring you have all the support you need.
Where can I download an ODBC driver for Excel?

All of the CData ODBC drivers, including the Excel ODBC driver are available for download online. To get started, download a fully functional free trial of the Excel ODBC driver today.
How do I install an ODBC driver for Excel?

To install the Excel driver, simply download one of the Excel ODBC driver installers available online. The download page includes separate Windows, macOS, and Unix installers, so please select the Excel ODBC driver that matches the platform where you intend to use the driver. The installers are comprehensive setup utilities that will install all the components required to use the Excel ODBC driver on your system.
Is the Excel ODBC driver 32-bit or 64-bit?

The Excel ODBC driver is available in both 32-bit and 64-bit binaries. The Excel driver installer will allow you to install both options, and you can select the ODBC driver binary that is appropriate for the system where you intend to use the driver.
Does pyODBC work with Excel?

Absolutely. The Excel ODBC driver seamlessly supports pyODBC connectivity. For example, check out this article on our online knowledgebase that demonstrates how you can connect to Excel from PyCharm using pyODBC and the Excel ODBC driver.

However, besides ODBC support, we also provide native Python data connectivity for Excel. To learn more, check out the Excel Python Connector online.
Does the ODBC connector support ARM64 devices?

Yes, our ODBC connector supports ARM64 Windows.