Convert SQL to Plain Text Online

Paste a SQL table below, edit it if you need to, and get Plain Text back. The conversion runs in your browser, so nothing is uploaded, there is no size limit and there is no signup.

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Nothing here is uploaded. The parsing happens on this page.

Edit

Paste or upload something above and it will appear here.

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Header rowDetect numbers

The output will appear here once there is a table to convert.

What SQL is

SQL here means the statements that move a table into a database: INSERT INTO with a VALUES list, and optionally the CREATE TABLE that defines the columns.

Anyone seeding a database, moving a spreadsheet into an application, or writing a migration.

What Plain Text is

Plain text here means columns lined up with spaces, the way a command line tool prints a table.

Terminal output, log files, fixed-width exports from older systems.

What changes when you convert SQL to Plain Text

Column names come from the INSERT column list, or from a CREATE TABLE if one is present. Quoted strings are unquoted, doubled quotes are collapsed, and NULL becomes an empty cell.

Columns are padded to the widest value. Width is counted in display columns rather than characters, so a table containing Chinese, Japanese or Korean text still lines up: those glyphs occupy two columns in a monospace font.

What carries over from SQL to Plain Text

SQL records 4 things about a table that plain text has no way to hold.

SQL distinguishes a number from the text of a number; plain text does not, so every value arrives as text and has to be re-parsed by whatever reads it next.

An empty cell and a missing one are the same thing in plain text, so a null and an empty string in the SQL both come out blank and can no longer be told apart.

A line break inside a cell ends the row in plain text, so line breaks are replaced rather than carried through.

plain text has no separate idea of a header, so the column names become an ordinary first row and nothing in the file marks them as different from the data.

The identifier 007 comes out of the Plain Text as 007. Reading it as a number would have made it 7, and an id that changes value is worse than one that stays text.

The role "Analyst, data" survives with its comma, in one cell rather than split across two. That is the first thing to check in any converted table, and the usual place a Plain Text file goes wrong.

The quotes around Jonah "Jo" Pryce are left as a plain quote character in the Plain Text.

A worked example

Three rows of staff data, with an identifier that has a leading zero, a value containing a comma, a value containing quotes and one blank cell. Those are the four places formats disagree, so they are the four places to look.

SQL in

INSERT INTO `staff` (`id`, `name`, `role`, `started`, `hours`) VALUES
  ('007', 'Halima Yusuf', 'Analyst, data', '2024-03-15', '38.5'),
  ('012', 'Jonah "Jo" Pryce', 'Engineer', '2025-11-02', NULL),
  ('104', 'Wei Chen', 'Manager', '2023-06-30', '40');

Plain Text out

id   name              role           started     hours
007  Halima Yusuf      Analyst, data  2024-03-15  38.5
012  Jonah "Jo" Pryce  Engineer       2025-11-02
104  Wei Chen          Manager        2023-06-30  40

Questions

How do I convert SQL to Plain Text?

Paste your SQL into the box above or drop the file onto it. Check the table in the grid, then copy or download the Plain Text from the output panel. It takes one step and the data never leaves your browser.

Are the generated INSERT statements safe to run?

Quotes in your data are escaped, so the statements are syntactically correct. They are not parameterised, which is fine for a one-off import you are running yourself and not fine as a pattern for application code that takes user input.

Will my numbers still be numbers?

They will read the same, but plain text stores them as text. Anything that sorts or sums the result will need to parse them first, and a leading zero or a currency symbol is the usual place that goes wrong.

One of my cells has a line break in it - what happens?

A line break would end the row in plain text, so it is replaced instead of carried through. The rest of the cell stays where it belongs.

Is there a limit on file size?

No. The work happens on your own machine, so the limit is your machine's memory rather than an upload cap. A file with tens of thousands of rows converts in a second or two.

Is my data uploaded anywhere?

No. The parsing and generating are done by JavaScript running on this page. You can watch the network tab while you convert and see that nothing is sent.