Open excel file in Python: XLRDError: Excel xlsx file; not supported

Question

I want to open an Excel file in Python, using:

import xlrd

loc = (r"C:\Users\my_path\my_file.xlsx")

wb = xlrd.open_workbook(loc)
sheet = wb.sheet_by_index(0)
sheet.cell_value(0, 0)

and it caught error:

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
XLRDError                                 Traceback (most recent call last)
<ipython-input-70-b399ced4986e> in <module>
      4 loc = (r"C:\Users\my_path\my_file.xlsx")
      5 
----> 6 wb = xlrd.open_workbook(loc)
      7 sheet = wb.sheet_by_index(0)
      8 sheet.cell_value(0, 0)

C:\Python38\lib\site-packages\xlrd\__init__.py in open_workbook(filename, logfile, verbosity, use_mmap, file_contents, encoding_override, formatting_info, on_demand, ragged_rows, ignore_workbook_corruption)
    168     # files that xlrd can parse don't start with the expected signature.
    169     if file_format and file_format != 'xls':
--> 170         raise XLRDError(FILE_FORMAT_DESCRIPTIONS[file_format]+'; not supported')
    171 
    172     bk = open_workbook_xls(

XLRDError: Excel xlsx file; not supported

What is wrong?

Do you have the right filename? It looks like you're trying to open a directory, rather than a specific Excel file within it; it would normally have an .xls or .xlsx extension... (or .xlsm or .xlsb etc). — Jiří Baum
– Jiří Baum, Commented May 5, 2021 at 3:16
Hi @sabik thank you for pointing out, please see the edited question. — nilsinelabore
– nilsinelabore, Commented May 5, 2021 at 3:25
Well now the error message tells you exactly what's wrong: "Excel xlsx file; not supported". Per the homepage of the xlrd library, it can only read "Excel files in the historical .xls format." — Jiří Baum
– Jiří Baum, Commented May 5, 2021 at 3:28
Hi @QuangHoang Thanks pd.read_excel(r'C:\Users\my_path\my_file.xlsx', engine="openpyxl") worked ! — nilsinelabore
– nilsinelabore, Commented May 5, 2021 at 3:41

Sudo Band · Accepted Answer · 2021-05-05 03:57:27Z

21

The lastest version of xlrd is only support .xls file, so you can install the older version

pip uninstall xlrd

pip install xlrd==1.2.0

answered May 5, 2021 at 3:57

Sudo Band

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Gengjun Wu · Accepted Answer · 2022-08-10 03:48:31Z

8

Or you can use the openpyxl to do it.

pip install openpyxl

If you use it in Pandas:

import pandas as pd
pd.read_excel('file/path/to/excel/spreadsheet.xlsx', engine='openpyxl')

If you don't specify the engine, it will use whatever default.

answered Aug 10, 2022 at 3:48

Gengjun Wu

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