How to export LinkedIn contacts and connections to Excel

To export LinkedIn contacts, you don't need anything but LinkedIn: its own data download gives you your connections as a CSV file that opens in Excel or Google Sheets. This guide walks through the request, explains what the file holds and why many email addresses are blank, and turns it into a contact list you'll actually use, for a job search, an address book, or a copy to keep before you change roles.

LinkedIn calls its export "Get a copy of your data". Use it in a browser on a computer: LinkedIn says the feature isn't available on mobile.

1. Click the Me icon at the top of your LinkedIn homepage.
2. Choose Settings & Privacy.
3. Click Data privacy on the left.
4. Under How LinkedIn uses your data, click Get a copy of your data (some versions of the page say Download your data).
5. Pick the data you want. For your network alone, choose Connections rather than the larger archive.
6. Click Request archive. LinkedIn emails a download link to your primary email address.

Per LinkedIn's help, asking for one kind of data, such as Connections, brings the email within minutes; the larger archive takes up to 24 hours. The link works for 72 hours, so download the file when it arrives. LinkedIn also advises downloading it to a personal computer, not a public one.

LinkedIn describes the connections file as each connection's first and last name, public profile address, email address, company, position, and the date you connected. Two limits come with it:

• 1st-degree connections only. LinkedIn can't export people you aren't connected to. The file is your own network, and that's the whole of it.
• Some names may not come through. LinkedIn says its CSV and vCard formats don't support all characters, so names in languages with extended character sets, such as Chinese, Japanese or Hebrew, aren't supported.

Expect the email column to be mostly empty. Each member chooses, in their own privacy settings, whether their connections may see or download their email address, and the export only includes the addresses of people who said yes. That's their choice, and the file respects it: there's no setting on your side that fills the gaps. If you need someone's address, ask them in a message.

To export LinkedIn connections to Excel, unzip the download if it came as a .zip, then open the connections CSV. Three things are worth checking once it's open:

• Rows above the headings. If the first rows are a note rather than column headings, delete them so the headings sit in row 1. Sorting and filtering need that.
• Names with odd characters. If accented letters show up garbled, close the file and import it instead: in Excel, Data › From Text/CSV, and choose 65001: Unicode (UTF-8) as the file origin.
• Dates that sort as text. If the connection dates won't sort in date order, they came in as text. Select the column and use Data › Text to Columns, choosing Date and the order the file writes it in.

The file is a starting point. A few minutes of work makes it a list you'll come back to:

• Add your own columns to the right of LinkedIn's: how you know the person, when you last spoke, and a Next step. These are yours, so keep them in a separate tab that looks rows up by profile address if you plan to export again.
• Sort by company, then position, to see who you know at the places you care about. A filter on the company column does the same for one company.
• Keep the date in the file name, such as connections-2026-10.csv. Companies and positions change, and the file shows them as they were the day you exported it.

Going into another app? Keep it as a CSV. Keeping your notes and formats? Save it as XLSX. Our guide to CSV or XLSX? has the longer answer.

LinkedIn's data download lists the companies you follow and the members you follow, but its help page names no file of the people who follow you. If followers are what you're after, the download won't give you them.

Tabless is a browser extension that builds what you ask for from the sites you allow; nothing is typed or submitted without your OK. It isn't open yet. Among the jobs we're building it for is this one in general: asking in plain words for a list from a site you use, and getting it as a CSV or XLSX file.

It's designed to read through the session your browser already has, so there are no API keys or passwords to hand over, and to ask before it reads each site. It's for lists you're entitled to see, for your own work, and the site's own rules still apply. You sign in to Tabless with a Wix account.

No. LinkedIn exports your 1st-degree connections only, and the download holds your own data, not other members'. If you want someone in your list, connect with them first.

LinkedIn says that if you choose one kind of data, such as Connections, it emails you within minutes, and the larger archive takes up to 24 hours. The download link then works for 72 hours.

No. LinkedIn says the data download isn't available on mobile, so request it from a browser on a computer.

In a browser on a computer, click the Me icon at the top of your LinkedIn homepage, choose Settings & Privacy, then Data privacy, and under How LinkedIn uses your data, click Get a copy of your data. Some versions of the page call it Download your data.

Not yet. Tabless isn't open, and LinkedIn's own download, as above, is the way to get your connections today. Join the waitlist, and we'll let you know when you can try Tabless.