Export Database To Excel In Python (Simple Example)

Welcome to a tutorial on how to export data from the database to an Excel spreadsheet in Python. So you want to generate an Excel report or create a list from the database? Well, it is actually a simple “read from database and write to Excel file”. Read on for the example!

 

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

 

EXAMPLE CODE DOWNLOAD

Source code on GitHub Gist

Just click on “download zip” or do a git clone. I have released it under the MIT license, so feel free to build on top of it or use it in your own project.

 

SORRY FOR THE ADS...

But someone has to pay the bills, and sponsors are paying for it. I insist on not turning Code Boxx into a "paid scripts" business, and I don't "block people with Adblock". Every little bit of support helps.

Buy Me A Coffee Code Boxx eBooks

 

 

 

QUICK SETUP

The “usual stuff”:

• Create a virtual environment virtualenv venv and activate it – venv\Scripts\activate (Windows) venv/bin/activate (Linux/Mac)
• Install required libraries – pip install openpyxl

 

STEP 1) DUMMY DATABASE

1A) USER TABLE & DATA

-- (A) USERS TABLE
CREATE TABLE users (
  uid INTEGER,
  name TEXT NOT NULL,
  email TEXT NOT NULL,
  tel TEXT NOT NULL,
  PRIMARY KEY("uid" AUTOINCREMENT)
);

-- (B) DUMMY DATA
INSERT INTO "users" VALUES
(1,'Jo Doe','jo@doe.com','465785'),
(2,'Joa Doe','joa@doe.com','123456'),
(3,'Job Doe','job@doe.com','234567'),
(4,'Joe Doe','joe@doe.com','345678'),
(5,'Jog Doe','jog@doe.com','578456'),
(6,'Joh Doe','joh@doe.com','378945'),
(7,'Joi Doe','joi@doe.com','456789'),
(8,'Jon Doe','jon@doe.com','987654'),
(9,'Jor Doe','jor@doe.com','754642'),
(10,'Joy Doe','joy@doe.com','124578');

For this example, we will be working with this simple dummy users table.

• uid User’s ID. Primary key and auto-increment.
• name The user’s name.
• email The user’s email address.
• tel Telephone number.

 

 

1B) CREATE DATABASE

# (A) LOAD PACKAGES
import sqlite3, os
from sqlite3 import Error

# (B) DATABASE + SQL FILE
DBFILE = "users.db"
SQLFILE = "s1_users.sql"

# (C) DELETE OLD DATABASE IF EXIST
if os.path.exists(DBFILE):
  os.remove(DBFILE)
 
# (D) IMPORT SQL
conn = sqlite3.connect(DBFILE)
with open(SQLFILE) as f:
  conn.executescript(f.read())
conn.commit()
conn.close()
print("Database created!")

To keep things easy, without having to install any databases – We are using SQLite here. This script should be self-explanatory, we are just  creating the users.db database file, and importing S1A_users.sql to create the table.

 

STEP 2) EXPORT TO EXCEL

# (A) INIT
# (A1) LOAD MODULES
import sqlite3, os, openpyxl
from sqlite3 import Error

# (A2) SETTINGS
DBFILE = "users.db"

# (B) OPEN DATABASE & CREATE EXCEL
conn = sqlite3.connect(DBFILE)
cursor = conn.cursor()
book = openpyxl.Workbook()
sheet = book.active
 
# (C) EXPORT DATA TO EXCEL
cursor.execute("SELECT * FROM `users`")
results = cursor.fetchall()
i = 0
for row in results:
  i += 1
  j = 1
  for col in row:
    cell = sheet.cell(row = i, column = j)
    cell.value = col
    j += 1
 
# (D) SAVE EXCEL FILE & CLOSE DB
book.save("demo.xlsx")
conn.close()

Lastly, this should be self-explanatory too… We are extracting records from the database and writing them into an Excel file. But just a quick note, Python is unable to write Excel files natively. So, we are using openpyxl to do the job here. Will leave a link to their documentation below if you want to learn more.

 

 

 

HOW ABOUT MYSQL, MSSQL, POSTGRESQL, ETC…

Well, this tutorial will never end if we went through each and every database on Earth. So I will leave this as “homework” – Study the basics of the database on your own, install your own preferred database management tool, change the SQL for the users table, and update s3_export.py to connect to the database of your choice instead.

 

ADDING FORMULAS

Just a quick note here that we can define Excel formulas as well, for example, cell.value = "=SUM(A1:A10)".

 

LINKS & REFERENCES

• Python MySQL
• Python MSSQL
• Python MongoDB
• Python PostgreSQL
• openpyxl