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Salesforce CSV Export: Text Fields Truncated When Opened in Excel

Date de publication: May 23, 2026
Description
When a data export is opened in a CSV program such as Excel, long text field data may be truncated.

The issue may seem random because it's not occurring for all records or long text fields. However, it should be consistent for affected records and fields in those records. Some records containing data in the same field may not be truncated and if you export from a report, the field's data may be complete.

This issue is not due to Salesforce and is instead unique to Excel and the way it interprets the first character contained in the affected record's text field.

This is known to occur if the field's data contains a dash or minus (-) or other special characters such as an at symbol (@) at the beginning of the affected field's data. Excel is trying to interpret the minus or at symbol as part of a formula, which is then automatically truncated to a 255 character limit.
Résolution

This article provides two workarounds to prevent Salesforce CSV export data from being truncated when opened in Microsoft Excel. The truncation occurs because Excel interprets leading dash (-) or at (@) symbols as formula syntax, which limits the text to 255 characters.

Potential workarounds to this Excel behavior:


Workaround A :

Remove the first - or @ signs from the affected field's data, or add a space at the very beginning of the affected field data before the sign.

If you want to mass update your file, please follow this work around.

1. Open CSV file with Notepad or any text editor

2. Run a find and replace for the following criteria:
 
Find:Replace with:
"-" -
"@" @
 
This way Excel will know this is text and not a formula and it will be able to properly represent it within the worksheet.

 


Workaround B:
Use an alternative program instead of Excel such as Notepad++ for example to modify and save your CSV files.


 

 

Numéro d’article de la base de connaissances

000382697

 
Chargement
Salesforce Help | Article