Most people arrive with a list already. It might be a proper spreadsheet, a tab in the accounts workbook, or something the last person to do a stocktake typed up. Whatever shape it’s in, you should not have to retype it.
The importer takes a CSV file and turns each row into an asset. You tell it which of your columns means what, it shows you exactly what it is about to do, and only then does it save anything. If it goes wrong, you can undo it.
You’ll find it at Settings → Import.
Before you start: five minutes that saves an hour
An import will only ever put your assets into things that already exist. It will never invent an asset type, a category, a manufacturer, a folder, a location, a project or a client from a spelling in your file.
That is deliberate. If we created things automatically, one typo would become a permanent duplicate — you’d end up with “Makita”, “makita ” and “MAKITA” as three separate brands, and no easy way to merge them.
So the first thing the Import screen shows you is a short checklist. Work through it and the import will go through cleanly:
- Asset types and ID format (Settings → Preferences) — this decides the Asset IDs your imported items get, for example TOOL-000001.
- Categories (Settings → Categories) — create the categories and sub-categories your spreadsheet refers to.
- Custom fields (Settings → Custom Fields) — anything Asset Giant doesn’t already have a column for. Create the field first and it becomes a column you can import into. Your plan sets how many custom fields you can have.
- Locations, projects and clients — create any you want to assign assets to.
See Managing Categories in Settings and Creating and Deleting Custom Fields if you need a hand with any of those.
Start from our template
There is a Download CSV template button on the Import screen, and it is worth using. The template isn’t a generic sample — it is built from your account. Your custom fields are already columns, and the example row uses your real asset types, categories and locations, so you can see exactly what a valid value looks like.
Paste your data underneath the example row, delete the example, and you have a file that will import first time.
If you’d rather use your own spreadsheet as it stands, that’s fine too — that’s what the matching step is for.
Saving your spreadsheet as a CSV
Asset Giant reads .csv files. Both Excel and Google Sheets export one in a couple of clicks:
- Excel — File → Save As, then choose CSV (Comma delimited).
- Google Sheets — File → Download → Comma-separated values (.csv).
- Numbers (Mac) — File → Export To → CSV.
The first row of the file must be your column headings. Files can be up to 5MB and 5,000 rows; if yours is bigger, split it and import the parts one after another.
Step 1: Upload
Drag your file onto the upload box, or click to choose it. Nothing is saved at this point — the file is only read.
Step 2: Match your columns
You’ll see one row for every column in your file: its heading, a couple of real values from your own data so you can see what’s in it, and a dropdown to choose what it should become.
Asset Giant has a go at matching these for you. It recognises its own export headings exactly, and it knows the common alternatives — Make becomes Manufacturer, Cost becomes Purchase Price, Qty becomes Quantity, Job becomes Project. Anything it doesn’t recognise is left blank for you to set, because a wrong guess is worse than no guess.
Only Asset Name is required. Every other column is optional. If your spreadsheet is just a list of names, that will import perfectly well and you can fill in the detail later.
Two things are worth knowing:
- Asset IDs are generated for you. Asset Giant creates them from the format in Settings → Preferences (TOOL-000001 and so on), and an import never overwrites them. If your file has its own reference or tag column you can still match it — it will be used to recognise assets you already have, not written over the Asset ID.
- Categories, locations and the rest are matched by name. A cell that says Main Workshop finds your location called “Main Workshop”. Capitals and extra spaces don’t matter. For a sub-category, use either its own name or the full path, written as Power Tools > Drills.
The three settings underneath
Below the matching table are three choices that apply to the whole file.
Recognise an existing asset by — if some rows are already in your inventory, tell us how to spot them. A serial number is usually the best answer, because it identifies one physical item. Asset names are the worst, because two drills are very often called the same thing. Choose Do not match if everything in the file is new.
When a row matches an existing asset — leave the existing asset alone, update it with the row from your file, or import it anyway as a second asset. This applies to the whole import; you can’t choose row by row.
When a category, location or similar does not exist — either don’t import that row and tell you so you can fix it (the default, and usually right), or import the row anyway and leave that one field empty.
Step 3: Preview — nothing has been saved yet
This is the important screen. Asset Giant checks every row and shows you what it is about to do: how many assets it will create, how many it will update, how many it will skip, and how many it cannot import.
Underneath, a table lists rows with the reason for each. The reasons are specific and tell you what to do about them, for example “Category “Fixings” does not exist yet. Create it first, then re-import.”
If your plan doesn’t have room for everything, you’ll be told here — before anything is written — exactly how many rows will not fit.
Nothing has been saved at this point. You can go back, fix the matching, or close the page entirely and no harm is done.
Step 4: Import
Click Import now and a progress bar runs while the assets are created. Larger files are processed in small batches so the import doesn’t time out and doesn’t slow the app down for everyone else, so give it a moment and keep the tab open until it finishes.
When it’s done you’ll see the final counts, a link straight to your inventory, and — if anything failed — a Download the rows that failed button.
That download is genuinely useful: it’s a CSV containing only the problem rows, in your original columns, with a first column explaining what was wrong with each one. Fix them in your spreadsheet, save it, and import just that file. You don’t have to touch the rows that worked.
What if my plan runs out part-way?
The import fills your plan up to its limit and stops there. It doesn’t fail, and it doesn’t half-write anything — the rows it couldn’t fit are reported as skipped and listed for you.
If you then upgrade, import the same file again with a matching key set (usually the serial number). Everything already imported is recognised and skipped, and only the remainder goes in. See Understanding Plan Limits & Over-Limit Behavior.
Undoing an import
Every import can be undone for 7 days. Go to Settings → Import, find it in the Recent imports table, and click Undo this import.
- Assets the import created are permanently deleted.
- Assets it changed are put back the way they were.
- Anything somebody has edited since the import is left alone and named in the result, so an undo can never quietly throw away someone’s work.
WARNING: Undo permanently deletes the assets an import created. If people have been adding photos or notes to them, those assets are the ones it will skip — but check the Recent imports table before you click if you’re unsure.
Would you rather we just did it?
On any paid plan, importing your spreadsheet is included. Send us the file and we’ll match it, import it, and tell you when it’s done. There’s no charge and no catch — we would rather you were up and running.
On the Free Forever plan we’re still happy to help if your spreadsheet won’t behave; email it over and we’ll talk you through it. Use How to Get Help and Support to get in touch.
Common problems
| What you see | What it means |
|---|---|
| “Please upload a .csv file” | The file is still an .xlsx or .numbers. Save it again as CSV. |
| “Could not find a header row” | The first row of your file needs to be your column names, not data. |
| “Category “X” does not exist yet” | Create it in Settings → Categories, then re-import. Or switch the third setting to “import the row anyway and leave that field empty”. |
| “You have more than one location called X” | Two of your locations share a name, so we won’t guess. Rename one. |
| “31/02/2026 is not a date we recognise” | Dates are read day first — 31/01/2026 or 2026-01-31 both work. That one is the 31st of February. |
| “That file has more than 5,000 rows” | Split it into a few smaller files and import them one after another. |