Modern CSV alternative
Intact CSV Editor vs Modern CSV
A fast, keyboard-driven CSV editor for Windows, Mac and Linux, with a long list of cell and selection commands. Intact CSV Editor does 36 things we did not find in Modern CSV's documentation — SQL queries, Parquet files and column rules among them — and 91 of the 96 features Modern CSV lists.
36
things Intact CSV Editor does that we did not find in Modern CSV's documentation, of the 57 we compared.
91 / 96
of the features Modern CSV lists are in Intact CSV Editor too, and 5 more in part.
0
of the features Modern CSV lists Intact CSV Editor does not have yet.
Where Intact CSV Editor is ahead
36 things we did not find in Modern CSV's documentation.
We read every page of its documentation, the command and settings references and the home page on 3 September 2026, and looked for each of them there.
Keeping data intact
- Keeps the byte-order mark
- Keeps comment lines
- Mainframe EBCDIC code pages
- Refuses a character the encoding cannot hold
Opening files
- Fixed-width files, with layouts you can keep
- Tables from web pages
- Log files read into columns by a pattern
- OpenDocument spreadsheets
- Parquet, Avro, ORC and Arrow, read and written
- SQLite databases
- SPSS, Stata, SAS, R and MATLAB files
- Open a file from a link
- vCards and your Mac's Contacts
- Excel workbooks, opened and saved as workbooks
Editing and cleaning
- The column's own values offered as you type
- Clusters of similar values, merged on request
- JSON inside a cell, edited as a tree
- Sort by several columns, then back to the file's order
- Reshape: wide to long, a cell split into rows
- Stack several files into one
Analysis
- Compare two files, value by value
- Rules for each column, checked on every row
- SQL across every open file
Automation
- AppleScript and Shortcuts
- A command-line tool and links into the app
- JavaScript macros
- A command palette
- Send the table through any program
Export
- Word and rich text
- Export to more than 30 formats
- HTML tables that sort themselves
- Saved export presets
Safety
- A copy kept before every save
- Unsaved work recovered after a crash
- Settings kept in a small file beside the data
On the Mac
- Eight languages
Side by side
Every feature we compared.
| Feature |  Intact CSV Editor | Modern CSV |
|---|---|---|
| Keeping data intact | ||
| Saves a file back byte for byte | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Detects the text encoding | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Mainframe EBCDIC code pages | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Keeps the byte-order mark | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Keeps comment lines | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Refuses a character the encoding cannot hold | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Quoting per column and per cell | Intact CSV Editor | In part |
| Opening files | ||
| Separator, quotes and line endings detected and shown | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Excel workbooks, opened and saved as workbooks | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| OpenDocument spreadsheets | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| JSON, JSON Lines, YAML and XML as tables | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Parquet, Avro, ORC and Arrow, read and written | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| SPSS, Stata, SAS, R and MATLAB files | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| SQLite databases | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Tables from web pages | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| vCards and your Mac's Contacts | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Log files read into columns by a pattern | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Open a file from a link | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Fixed-width files, with layouts you can keep | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Millions of rows | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Rules for the files in a folder | Intact CSV Editor | In part |
| Editing and cleaning | ||
| The column's own values offered as you type | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Fill handle that continues a series | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| JSON inside a cell, edited as a tree | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Find and replace with regular expressions and a preview | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| A filter on every column heading, with counts | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Sort by several columns, then back to the file's order | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Duplicates judged on the columns you choose | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Rewrite dates and number formats | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Reshape: wide to long, a cell split into rows | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Stack several files into one | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Clusters of similar values, merged on request | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Analysis | ||
| SQL across every open file | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Summaries and pivot tables with subtotals | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Statistics for every column | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Look values up in another table | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Compare two files, value by value | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Rules for each column, checked on every row | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Automation | ||
| JavaScript macros | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Send the table through any program | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| AppleScript and Shortcuts | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| A command-line tool and links into the app | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| A command palette | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Shortcuts you can change, sequences too | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Export | ||
| Export to more than 30 formats | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| PDF export, PDF/A too | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Word and rich text | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Copy as Markdown, JSON, SQL, HTML and more | Intact CSV Editor | In part |
| HTML tables that sort themselves | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Saved export presets | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Split a file into several | Intact CSV Editor | In part |
| Safety | ||
| A copy kept before every save | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Unsaved work recovered after a crash | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| Knows when another program changes the file | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Lock a file against changes | Intact CSV Editor | Documented |
| Settings kept in a small file beside the data | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
| On the Mac | ||
| Eight languages | Intact CSV Editor | —Not in their documentation |
DocumentedDocumentedIn partIn part—Not in their documentationNot in their documentation·Not comparedNot compared
Choose Intact CSV Editor if…
- Your files must come back exactly as they came — byte for byte, in their own separator, quoting, encoding and line endings.
- You open more than CSV: Excel, JSON, Parquet, SPSS, Stata, SAS, EBCDIC and more — and export to 33 formats.
- You want SQL across files, column rules, file comparison and a backup before every save, in one app.
- You work on a Mac and want an app made for it, in eight languages, from a company in Zürich you can call.
MCChoose Modern CSV if…
- Runs on Windows and Linux as well as the Mac — one tool for a mixed team.
- Manages the file itself from inside the app: go to, duplicate, rename, move and delete it.
- A keyboard-driven command set, with a reference page for every command.
| Intact CSV Editor | Modern CSV | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Native Mac editor for CSV and 30+ data formats | Cross-platform CSV editor |
| Runs on | Mac (macOS 14 or later) | Windows, Mac and Linux |
| Only here | 36 of the 57 features we compared | 0 of the 96 features it lists |
In fairness
Where Modern CSV goes further
Every feature Modern CSV documents is in Intact CSV Editor. In 5 of them, Modern CSV does more:
- Go to a file by name
- Duplicate, rename, move and delete the file from inside the app
- A tutorial file
- Load and save parameters kept apart in one dialog
- Hide the parts of the window you do not want
Sources
https://www.moderncsv.com — read 3 September 2026: every page of its documentation, the command and settings references and the home page. Product names belong to their owners. Found something out of date? Tell us.
Everything Modern CSV documents — 96 features, and whether Intact CSV Editor does it
| Modern CSV documents | In Intact CSV Editor |
|---|---|
| Cell content | |
| Append and prepend text to the selected cells | Yes |
| Remove leading zeros | Yes |
| Zero-fill whole numbers to a width | Yes |
| Set the number of decimals | Yes |
| Convert the number format in place | Yes |
| Convert date and time formats in place | Yes |
| Keep only the left / middle / right part of the selected cells | Yes |
| Fill with a series | Yes |
| Random integers and decimals into the selection | Yes |
| Insert the current date and time into the selection | Yes |
| Convert to an acronym | Yes |
| UPPER_SNAKE_CASE | Yes |
| Rows, columns and cells | |
| Insert rows or columns several times over | Yes |
| Duplicate rows or columns several times over | Yes |
| Insert cells, moving the rest of the row or column along | Yes |
| Remove cells, closing the gap | Yes |
| Remove duplicates based on the selected columns only | Yes |
| Remove empty rows based on the selected columns only | Yes |
| Remove duplicate columns | Yes |
| Remove the rest of the rows or columns from the selection on | Yes |
| Remove extraneous rows and columns | Yes |
| Move rows and columns by keyboard | Yes |
| Move a row or column to a named position | Yes |
| Reshape a selection row-wise or column-wise | Yes |
| Add or update an ID column | Yes |
| Set column width and row height numerically | Yes |
| Selection and navigation | |
| Select whole rows or columns, header excluded | Yes |
| Select to the start or end of a row or column | Yes |
| Select duplicate rows (optionally by selected columns) | Yes |
| Invert the selection by rows or by columns | Yes |
| Go to top, bottom, far left, far right | Yes |
| Page up, down, left, right | Yes |
| Go to a file by name | Partly |
| Find, filter and sort | |
| Filter syntax in one field | Yes |
| Filter by the selected cells' contents | Yes |
| Choose which values of a column to keep | Yes |
| Filter a row rather than a column | Yes |
| Edit the filters already applied, and remove them one at a time | Yes |
| Permanently remove everything filtered out or hidden | Yes |
| Find all matches / select all matches | Yes |
| Replace the previous match | Yes |
| Sort a row (left to right) | Yes |
| Sort the selected cells only, vertically or horizontally | Yes |
| Keep sort and filters when the file is reloaded | Yes |
Show 52 more
| Analysis | |
|---|---|
| Statistics window: count, sum, mean, variance, standard deviation, median, min, max, 20/40/60/80th percentiles | Yes |
| Column attributes: field counts, percent non-empty, shortest and longest field, detected type | Yes |
| Unique values with frequency, percentage and a histogram | Yes |
| Pivot table | Yes |
| Column lookup (VLOOKUP across files) | Yes |
| Files and the workbench | |
| Open a folder and list its table files | Yes |
| Close all files, or all but this one | Yes |
| Save only the visible data to a new file | Yes |
| Duplicate, rename, move and delete the file from inside the app | Partly |
| Save after every edit | Yes |
| Open the file in an external text editor | Yes |
| Open a terminal at the file's folder | Yes |
| Copy the file name, the file path, the folder path | Yes |
| Follow the selected hyperlinks | Yes |
| Email the selected addresses | Yes |
| Web search for the selected text, with a choice of engine | Yes |
| Print, with page setup, gridlines, headers and page order | Yes |
| Read-only above a size threshold | Yes |
| View and settings | |
| Freeze header rows as well as columns | Yes |
| Shade every other column | Yes |
| Highlight the selected cell's row and column | Yes |
| Column labels as letters or numbers, and a configurable first index | Yes |
| Several header rows, and header columns | Yes |
| Empty rows and columns beyond the data to type into | Yes |
| Snap to row or column after scrolling | Yes |
| Auto-fit row height | Yes |
| Five themes | Yes |
| Edit the settings and shortcuts as files, and restore them | Yes |
| List the available character encodings | Yes |
| Check for updates | Yes |
| A tutorial file | Partly |
| Read again, more closely (basics, customisation, edit-data) | |
| Five parsing standards, not one | Yes |
| Load and save parameters kept apart in one dialog | Partly |
| Per-extension defaults for delimiter, encoding, line ending and standard | Yes |
| Generate UUIDs into the selection | Yes |
| Date conversion with named formats | Yes |
| Split by index, not only by delimiter | Yes |
| Keep part of a value by index, with negatives | Yes |
| Move and duplicate cell contents with the keyboard | Yes |
| Select to the next block edge | Yes |
| Non-contiguous selection with ⌘-click | Yes |
| Find: match whole word, match whole cell, only in the selection | Yes |
| Preview a replacement before making it | Yes |
| Shortcuts as sequences and alternatives | Yes |
| Hide the parts of the window you do not want | Partly |
| Row and column labels configurable | Yes |
| A separate editing pane that takes newlines and tabs | Yes |
| Remove leading zeros, carefully | Yes |
| Convert to an acronym, and their honesty about it | Yes |
| Random values with a range syntax | Yes |
| Select the whole table from the corner button | Yes |
| Arrow keys under the home row | Yes |
Questions
About this comparison
Is Intact CSV Editor a good alternative to Modern CSV?
For most people who work on a Mac, yes. It does 91 of the 96 features Modern CSV lists, 5 more in part, and 36 things we did not find in Modern CSV's documentation — SQL queries, Parquet files and column rules among them. Where Modern CSV is ahead is listed on this page too.
Does Intact CSV Editor have more features than Modern CSV?
Of the 57 features of Intact CSV Editor we looked for in Modern CSV's documentation, we found 21, some of them only in part; the other 36 we did not find. The other way round, Intact CSV Editor lacks 0 of the 96 features Modern CSV lists.
How was this comparison made?
We read every page of its documentation, the command and settings references and the home page on 3 September 2026. Every feature Modern CSV lists was checked against Intact CSV Editor, and every one of Intact CSV Editor's was looked for in Modern CSV's pages. A dash means we found nothing like it there; Modern CSV may do more than it documents. If something has changed, write to info@marketvision.ch and we will correct it.
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