When opening a CSV file with Excel, some symbols or characters may become garbled.
Below, we have summarized common examples and the steps to display them correctly.
Common Garbled Patterns
Cases that have occurred in practice:
- ℉ (Fahrenheit degree symbol)
- ® (Registered trademark symbol)
Other likely cases:
- Superscripts: ², ³ (Square/Cube: e.g., m², m³)
- Subscripts: ₂ (Chemical formula: e.g., CO₂, SO₄²⁻)
- Superscript signs: ⁺, ⁻ (Ions: e.g., Na⁺, Cl⁻)
These characters cannot be displayed correctly with Shift_JIS, so UTF-8 must be used.
If garbled characters occurs when you open a CSV file, the methods described on this page can resolve it.
Recommended Method for Each Operating Environment
For Windows Users:
- Shift_JIS
- When you double-click a CSV file to open it in Windows Excel, it is often automatically detected as Shift_JIS, so it may display correctly in some cases.
- However, special symbols such as ℉, ®, ², ³, ⁺, ⁻ will be garbled. In such cases, please choose UTF-8.
- UTF-8
- This is required if special symbols are included.
- To open it in Excel, you must specify the character code using the "Get Data" function (see below).
For Mac Users:
- Please choose UTF-8.
- Since Shift_JIS is not commonly used as standard in the Mac environment, UTF-8 is the default.
- When opening in Excel, specifying the character code via the "Get Data" function, similar to Windows, is the most reliable method.
Recommended Method Common to Windows / Mac
The most reliable way to open a CSV file correctly is to import it by specifying the character code using Excel's "Get Data" function.
This method works for both Windows and Mac and minimizes the risk of garbling.
- Select "UTF-8" when exporting the CSV from Chemican.
- Start Excel and open a new workbook.
- From the "Data" tab, select [Get Data] → [From Text/CSV].
- Specify the CSV file, and in the import screen, set "File Origin/Character Code" to "UTF-8".
- Confirm that the characters are displayed correctly in the preview, and click [Load].
Note: This method is common to Windows / Mac. It is the most reliable way to display a CSV correctly with the least risk of garbling when opening it in Excel.
Notes:
- If you double-click to open the CSV directly, Excel may automatically use Shift_JIS for detection, which can cause garbling. For UTF-8, we strongly recommend loading it using the procedure above.
- File name garbling may occur when performing ZIP compression/decompression on Windows. If the file name is garbled, please use a decompression software that supports UTF-8.