You found the perfect table — market data, sports stats, a price comparison — and now you need it in Excel. Simple copy-paste usually mangles it: merged cells break, numbers arrive as text, and half the columns land in one.
Here are three ways to do it properly, from free-and-manual to one click.
1. Copy-paste with "Paste Special"
Select the table in the browser, copy, then in Excel use Paste Special → Text (or Ctrl+Shift+V). Excel tries to split columns by tabs.
Works when: the table is simple, with no merged cells or nested elements. Breaks when: the site uses custom layouts, sticky headers or JavaScript rendering — which is most modern sites.
2. Excel's built-in "Get Data from Web"
In Excel: Data → Get Data → From Web, paste the page URL and let Power Query detect tables.
Works when: the table is static HTML and the page is public. Breaks when: the table loads via JavaScript (Power Query sees the empty page), the site requires login, or you just need it now without setting up a query.
3. A browser extension (one click)
A table extractor runs inside your browser, so it sees exactly what you see — including tables rendered by JavaScript and pages behind a login.
With TableGrab the flow is: open the page → click the TableGrab icon → it highlights every table it detects → choose CSV, XLSX or Google Sheets. The cleaning is automatic: empty rows dropped, headers detected, numeric columns typed as numbers (so 1,234.56 doesn't arrive as text).
Works when: any table you can see in the browser.
Cost: free for 5 exports/day; Pro ($3.99/month) removes the limit and adds native .xlsx and one-click Google Sheets export.
Which one should you use?
- One-off, simple table → copy-paste is fine.
- Recurring import from a static page → Power Query is worth the setup.
- Anything else — JavaScript tables, logged-in pages, daily work → a browser extension saves you the most time per week.