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TSV → JSON

Convert TSV to JSON

The useful shape is almost always an array of objects, one per row, with the header supplying the keys. What decides whether the result is usable is what happens to empty cells and to numbers — and that is a choice, not a detail.

How to do it

  1. Open the file and confirm the first row is being treated as a header. If it is not, the keys will be wrong and everything downstream inherits the mistake.
  2. Fix duplicate or empty header names first. Two columns called "name" collapse into one key and silently lose a column.
  3. Export as JSON and choose the shape: objects keyed by header, or arrays of raw values.

Do it in the editor

What usually goes wrong

  • Empty cells

    An empty cell can become an empty string or be left out of the object entirely. The two produce different code on the other side; pick knowingly.

  • Numbers that are not numbers

    A postcode, a product code and a version string all look numeric and none of them are. Values stay strings, which is the only choice that never corrupts data.

  • Ragged rows

    A row with fewer cells than the header produces objects with missing keys. Those rows are flagged in the review panel before you export.

The reverse trip is available too, and round-trips without loss as long as every object shares the same keys.