Export InfoPath forms to Excel, every field included
SharePoint's list view only ever showed the fields someone chose to promote. Exporting that view to Excel gives you the same handful of columns. The rest of the answers are still inside each XML file.
To export InfoPath forms to Excel with every field, drag the folder of .xml submissions (and the .xsn template, if you have it) into FormArchive and export to Excel or CSV. Each form becomes one row and every field in the form's schema becomes a column, including fields that were never promoted to SharePoint columns. Repeating sections and tables are written to their own sheets with the parent form's file name in each row, so you can join them back together in Excel, Power BI or a database.
Why 'Export to Excel' in SharePoint isn't enough
When a form is published to a SharePoint library, the designer picks which fields to promote to columns. Only those appear in the library view, and only those come out of SharePoint's Export to Excel. Unpromoted fields were never copied anywhere; they exist only in the XML of each submission. In many libraries that is most of the form.
Repeating fields are worse. InfoPath could promote a repeating field only as a single value: the first, the last, a count, a sum or a merged string. The individual rows were never columns.
How FormArchive lays out the workbook
- Forms sheet: one row per submission, one column per non-repeating field, plus the source file name and the form's created and modified dates when the XML carries them.
- One sheet per repeating section or table: one row per item, with the file name of the form it belongs to. Nested repeating sections get their own sheet with keys to both levels.
- Column names come from the schema's field names, with the group path when two fields share a name. Display labels from the template are used as a header row when you choose.
- CSV writes the same structure as one file per sheet, in UTF-8.
The do-it-yourself route
Excel can import XML directly through the Developer tab's XML Source pane or by opening the file and accepting an inferred schema. For a single flat form that works. For a library it means importing thousands of files, and Excel flattens repeating data by repeating every parent value on each row, which makes the sheet hard to total and easy to double-count. Power Query can combine a folder of XML files, but the query has to be built by hand for each form's structure.
Open your InfoPath forms now
Drop in the template and a folder of submissions. Preview 10 forms free, on your own computer.
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Works with InfoPath 2007, 2010 and 2013 forms. Mac and Windows.
FAQ
Will unpromoted fields be included?
Yes. FormArchive reads every element in the XML, so fields that were never promoted to SharePoint columns get their own Excel columns.
How are repeating tables exported?
Each repeating section or table gets its own sheet, one row per item, with the source form's file name so you can link the rows back to the form.
Can I get CSV instead of .xlsx?
Yes. CSV export writes one UTF-8 file per sheet with the same columns.
Do I need the template to export to Excel?
No. The field data is all in the XML. The template only adds friendlier display labels for the header row.