CSV Format

QuickBudget can round-trip a plain CSV file through any spreadsheet app (Excel, Numbers, Google Sheets). This page explains the format so you can edit exported CSVs safely and fix anything that causes an import error.

Columns

The file must have Item and Category columns. Amount and Frequency are optional but recommended.

Item: The name of the budget row (e.g. "Rent", "Groceries", "Salary").
Category: The budget category this row belongs to. Must match one of your existing categories (e.g. housing, food, income). Rows in unknown categories are skipped.
Amount: A number. Currency symbols ($, €, £) and US-style thousands separators (1,234.56) are stripped. Values that can't be parsed become 0.
Frequency: One of the canonical values below, or a recognized alias. See accepted values.

Frequency values

These are the canonical frequencies QuickBudget stores. Match one of these exactly (case-insensitive) for a clean round-trip.

daily
weekly
every 2 weeks
semi-monthly
monthly
quarterly
every 6 months
annually

Recognized aliases

These common variants are auto-mapped to a canonical value during import.

You write	Stored as
`annual`, `yearly`, `per year`	`annually`
`per month`, `once a month`	`monthly`
`per week`, `once a week`	`weekly`
`fortnightly`, `bi-weekly`, `every other week`	`every 2 weeks`
`twice a month`, `semi monthly`, `twice per month`	`semi-monthly`
`biannually`, `semi-annually`, `twice a year`	`every 6 months`
`every quarter`, `per quarter`	`quarterly`

Not aliased: bi-monthly/bimonthly is ambiguous (could mean every two months or twice a month). Use one of the canonical values instead.

Instructions block

Exported CSVs have a short block at the top between ### QUICKBUDGET_INSTRUCTIONS_START ### and ### QUICKBUDGET_INSTRUCTIONS_END ###. It's a friendly cheat sheet for anyone editing the file — the import parser ignores everything above the Item, Category header, so you can delete it without breaking anything.

Amount format

Amounts can include currency symbols and US-style thousands separators: $1,500.00, €300, 1234.56 all parse. Comma-decimal European formats like 1.234,56 aren't auto-detected — remove the thousands separator (→ 1234,56) or reformat to a dot-decimal before importing.

Exporting from other spreadsheet apps

.numbers and .docx files aren't supported directly. Export them as CSV or XLSX first:

Microsoft Excel: File → Save As → CSV UTF-8 (Comma delimited). (XLSX also works.)
Apple Numbers: File → Export To → CSV…. Leave encoding at Unicode (UTF-8).
Google Sheets: File → Download → Comma-separated values (.csv).

XLSX: merged cells

Merged cells make it ambiguous which row a value belongs to, so the import rejects workbooks that contain any. Unmerge cells in your source file (Home → Merge & Center → Unmerge in Excel) and try again.

XLSX: password-protected workbooks

QuickBudget can't read encrypted workbooks. Remove the password in Excel (File → Info → Protect Workbook → Encrypt with Password, clear the field) and try again.

File too large

Files over 10 MB are rejected before parsing to protect your browser from runaway memory use. If your file is that big, it likely contains a lot of hidden rows or metadata — try saving as CSV (not XLSX) or split into smaller files.

Privacy

Import and export happen entirely in your browser. Nothing is uploaded.