# Import PDF to Excel Free With Get Data, Step by Step - Author: CheapBankConvert (https://cheapbankconvert.com) - Published: 2026-10-16 - Category: Free tools you already own - Canonical: https://cheapbankconvert.com/blog/import-pdf-to-excel-free > Import PDF to Excel free with the Get Data tool you already own: which versions have it, the steps, the right table, and joining a multi-page statement. You can import a PDF to Excel free with Get Data, the built-in tool on the Data tab. Choose Get Data, From File, From PDF, pick the tables you want and load them. It reads text PDFs only, and a multi-page bank statement can arrive as one table per page that you join yourself. ## Which Excel versions can import a PDF? Excel can import a PDF if its Data tab offers Get Data with a From PDF choice under From File. Microsoft's page on [importing data from data sources in Excel](https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/import-data-from-data-sources-power-query-be4330b3-5356-486c-a168-b68e9e616f5a) has a section on the PDF connector and applies to Microsoft 365, Excel 2024, 2021, 2019 and 2016. Do not rely on a version list alone. The quickest check is to look at your own ribbon. ### How to check your copy Open Excel and select the Data tab. Look for a button called Get Data at the far left. Click it, point at From File and read the submenu. If you see From PDF, you have the feature. If the submenu stops at Workbook, Text/CSV, XML and JSON, your copy does not have it. Some older installs show a "Get External Data" group instead of Get Data. That group is the older design and does not include a PDF option. Run these steps in the desktop app. ### What to do if you do not have it You still have options without buying a converter. Word can open a PDF, Google Docs can read one, and copy and paste works in any version. [A comparison of four $0 ways to turn a PDF into Excel](/blog/can-i-convert-pdf-to-excel) ranks them. For a Google-based route in full, see [converting through Google Docs and Sheets](/blog/pdf-to-spreadsheet-converter-free). ### The one setup note Microsoft gives Microsoft's page says the PDF connector needs the .NET Framework 4.5 or higher. If Excel shows the message "This connector requires one or more additional components to be installed", install that framework and try again. ## Import PDF to Excel free: the Get Data from PDF steps The Get Data from PDF steps take about two minutes to run: open the Data tab, choose the PDF, select its tables and load them to a sheet. The screenshot list after the steps shows what to capture if you are writing these down for a team. 1. Open a new, blank workbook in Excel. 2. Select the **Data** tab on the ribbon. 3. Click **Get Data**, then **From File**, then **From PDF**. 4. In the file dialog, select your PDF and click **Open**. 5. Wait while the **Navigator** window loads. It shows a list of items on the left and a preview on the right. 6. Click one item to preview it. To bring in several pages, tick **Select multiple items** and tick each table you want. 7. Click **Transform Data** if you want to clean the tables first, or **Load** to place them on sheets as they are. 8. If you chose several tables and want one list, open Power Query, choose **Append Queries** on the Home tab and add the tables together. 9. Click **Close & Load** to send the result to a worksheet. ### Screenshot list If you document the process for someone else, five screenshots cover it: - The Data tab with the Get Data menu open on From PDF. - The file picker with your PDF selected. - The Navigator with Select multiple items ticked. - The Power Query window after Append Queries. - The final worksheet after Close & Load. ### What you get Excel creates a query. A query is a saved recipe for how the data was imported, so you can refresh it later. Each loaded table becomes an Excel table with a name such as Table001 (Page 1). The numbers and text may need further repair, but the structure arrives intact. ### Common stumbles in the steps If the Navigator is empty, the PDF is probably a scan. Get Data reads text only, so an image-based PDF gives nothing. If the file will not load at all, close it in your PDF reader first, because a file open elsewhere can block the import. And if you see only a few tables when you expected one per page, the PDF may be mixed, with some pages as images. ## Picking the right table in the PDF import Navigator The Navigator lists everything Excel found in the PDF, and the right table is the one whose preview shows your transaction rows with a date, a description and an amount. Excel names items Table001, Table002 and so on, and also lists whole pages as Page001, Page002. For a bank statement, you will usually see this pattern: | Navigator item | What it usually holds | | --- | --- | | Table001 (Page 1) | The account summary box, or the first block of transactions | | Table002 (Page 1) | Sometimes a second block on the same page | | Table003 (Page 2) | The transaction list continued | | Page001 | The whole page as one loose grid of text | The names above are an example. Your file will number things differently, so click each item and read the preview before you tick anything. ### Table or Page? A Table item is where Excel found a grid it believes is a table. A Page item is the entire page treated as one block. Prefer Tables when they show clean columns. Fall back to a Page when no Table looks right, and then expect to remove the extra rows that come with the page, such as the bank address and the footer. ### How to tell you have the right one Look for three things in the preview. First, a column of dates. Second, a column of amounts. Third, a row count close to the number of lines on the printed page. If the preview shows only four rows when the page has thirty, you picked a summary box and not the transaction list. ## Multi-page PDF import edge case: one table per page A multi-page statement often imports as one table per page, so a five-page statement can give you five tables, not one. To join them, select every page table in the Navigator, open Power Query and append the tables into a single query. The tables append cleanly only when their columns match. Excel tries to join pages for you first. [Microsoft's Power Query PDF connector reference](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/power-query/connectors/pdf) says its multi-page tables option, on by default, combines similar tables on consecutive pages into one. Check the Navigator for a single table that already holds rows from every page before you append by hand. A statement whose pages differ, such as a first page with a summary box, may still split. Here is the routine when it does, using an example five-page statement: 1. In the Navigator, tick **Select multiple items** and tick Table001 through Table005. 2. Click **Transform Data**. Five queries appear on the left of the Power Query window. 3. On the Home tab, choose **Append Queries as New**. 4. Pick **Three or more tables**, add all five and click OK. 5. Rename the new query, for example Statement. 6. Check the row count at the bottom of the window against the number of transactions on the paper statement. ### When the columns do not match Power Query matches columns by name. Excel names them Column1, Column2 and so on, so pages with the same layout line up. If page three has an extra column because a wrapped description was split in two, the appended table gets a Column6 that is empty on the other pages. Fix that before you append: open the odd page, merge the two description columns and then append. ### Repeated header rows Every page may repeat the column headings. After the append, those headings sit in the middle of your data as rows that read Date, Description, Amount. Filter them out in Power Query by removing rows where the Date column equals the word Date. Do it before you change any column types, or the type change will throw errors on those rows. ## Cleaning imported PDF data in Power Query Power Query is the window that opens when you click Transform Data, and it can remove headers, blank rows and stray columns without changing the PDF or your sheet. Each cleanup step is recorded, so refreshing the query repeats the steps on the next file. The cleanups a bank statement usually needs: - **Promote headers.** On the Home tab choose Use First Row as Headers, if the first row holds Date, Description and Amount. - **Remove blank rows.** Choose Remove Rows, then Remove Blank Rows. - **Remove top rows.** If the page starts with an address block, use Remove Rows, Remove Top Rows and enter the count. - **Filter repeats.** Click the filter arrow on the Date column and untick the word Date. - **Set column types.** Set Date to Date and the amount columns to Decimal Number. ### The date trap Statements often print a date without a year, such as 03/14. Power Query reads that using your computer's regional settings and may assume the current year. For a statement that crosses a year end, check the January lines by hand. If they show the wrong year, add a column that builds the right year from the statement period. ### Where this gets slow Each of these steps is quick on its own. The time goes into the exceptions: a page with an extra column, a row that wrapped, an amount typed with a trailing minus sign. On a long statement that is where the free route costs real minutes. Pricing the cleanup against a paid conversion is covered in [what a $0 conversion costs in cleanup time](/blog/can-i-convert-pdf-to-excel#what-a-0-pdf-to-excel-method-costs-in-cleanup-time). ## Does a PDF import in Excel keep negative amounts? A PDF import keeps a negative amount only when the statement prints it with a minus sign or in brackets that Excel reads as a negative number. Many statements print debits as positive numbers in a separate Withdrawals column, and the import copies them as positives. Three layouts show up most often: - **Signed amounts in one column.** A minus sign marks a debit. The import usually keeps it, but may read it as text. - **Separate Withdrawals and Deposits columns.** Both are positive. You decide which to turn negative. - **A trailing minus or "CR" and "DR" markers.** A value such as 412.80- arrives as text, not as a number. ### Checking that the sign came through Add a quick test next to the data: a total of the amount column and a comparison with the statement's printed totals. If your sum of deposits minus withdrawals equals the change between the opening and closing balances, the signs are right. If not, look first at rows where the amount landed as text, which Excel left-aligns by default. ### Amounts that arrive as text When a number is stored as text, sums skip it and filters sort it wrongly. Setting the column type to Decimal Number in Power Query fixes most cases. For the cases it does not fix, [why free XLSX files store amounts as text](/blog/convert-pdf-to-xlsx-free#why-free-xlsx-files-store-amounts-as-text) explains the cause and the repair in full. ### If you would rather skip the cleanup When the page count, header repeats and sign fixes add up to more time than you want to spend, a per-document converter is the alternative. [CheapBankConvert](/) turns a PDF statement into a CSV or an Excel file with amounts stored as numbers, and it lets you preview the first 2 pages before you pay. It is not open yet, so [get started](/get-started) to be told when it opens. For other ways in, [how to put a PDF into Excel](/blog/how-to-put-a-pdf-into-excel) compares opening, importing and inserting, and [the Google Sheets route](/blog/pdf-to-spreadsheet-converter-free) covers the no-Excel case.