To view and edit an Excel .xlsx file inside IntelliJ IDEA, PyCharm, DataSpell or another JetBrains IDE, install XLSX Editor + Agent Reader and double-click the file: it opens as a table where you edit cells, insert and delete rows, switch sheets, undo and save. To let Claude Code, Cursor or another AI coding agent read the workbook, turn on the IDE's MCP server and connect the agent: it reads any cell range as CSV, with no conversion script. The workbook your script just wrote, the test data in your repository and the report a colleague sent all open right next to your code.
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> Read the "Orders" sheet of data/orders.xlsx and check the totals. xlsx_read_range file: data/orders.xlsx sheet: Orders range: A1:D4 Sheet "Orders" (sheets in this workbook: "Orders", "Customers"), range A1:D4 (4 rows x 4 columns). CSV follows (RFC 4180 quoting): Order,Customer,Qty,Total 1001,"Smith, Anna",3,59.97 1002,Kato,1,19.99 1003,Lee,2,39.98
007 stay text, =SUM(A1:A3) becomes a formula, a leading ' keeps the value as text, and date cells take 2026-01-31, 2026-01-31 13:45 or 13:45. Formulas that depend on a changed cell are recalculated.With this plugin, Claude Code, Cursor or any AI agent connected to the IDE's MCP server reads the cells of an Excel workbook directly, so it can check a generated report, read test data or compare two sheets in the same conversation.
xlsx_read_range takes a workbook path, a sheet name and a range such as A1:D20, A:C (whole columns) or 2:5 (whole rows). An empty range returns every used cell.=SUM(A1:A3).xlsx_read_range then appears in the agent's tool list.This is a paid product that we keep working on: bug fixes and updates for new IDE releases. An annual subscription includes a perpetual fallback license: after twelve consecutive paid months, you keep a working version even if you stop subscribing. Questions sent to gramshift.official@gmail.com get an answer within two business days for serious problems and within five business days for everything else, and errors inside the plugin can be reported straight from the IDE's error dialog.
Install XLSX Editor + Agent Reader from Settings | Plugins | Marketplace and double-click the .xlsx file in the Project view. It opens as a table in the IDE, where you edit cells, insert and delete rows, add a column, switch sheets, undo with Ctrl+Z and save with Ctrl+S. The same works in DataSpell, WebStorm, GoLand, PhpStorm, Rider, Android Studio and other JetBrains IDEs from version 2025.2.
Yes. With XLSX Editor + Agent Reader the .xlsx file opens and saves inside PyCharm itself, so Excel does not need to be installed on the machine. Formula cells show the result saved in the file, and the editor recalculates formulas after you change a cell.
Enable the MCP server in Settings | Tools | MCP Server of your JetBrains IDE and connect the agent there. XLSX Editor + Agent Reader adds the tool xlsx_read_range, which takes a workbook path, a sheet name and a range such as A1:D20 and returns the cells as CSV, with a first line that names the sheet, lists every sheet and gives the exact range returned. The agent reads the workbook directly, with no conversion script.
By default it gets the values with their number and date formats applied, and formula cells as their saved results. Ask for formulas and the same cells come back as formulas such as =SUM(A1:A3). If the workbook is open in the editor, the agent reads what the editor shows, including unsaved edits, and the result says so.
Double-click the .xlsx file in the Project view and it opens as a table next to your code. Keep it open and run the script again: when the file is rewritten and the table has no unsaved edits, the table reloads by itself and shows the new output.
Yes. Cell values, cell styles, formulas and merged cells are kept when you save. If the workbook also contains charts, pivot tables or embedded objects, see the Limits section on this page before saving.
No. The plugin makes no network connections. The xlsx_read_range tool reads only files inside the open project and returns the cells only to the AI agent you connected.
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Works in IntelliJ IDEA, PyCharm, DataSpell, WebStorm, GoLand, PhpStorm, Rider, CLion, RubyMine, RustRover and other IntelliJ-based IDEs from version 2025.2, and in Android Studio from Otter 2025.2.1.
Only .xlsx workbooks are opened. Old .xls files (also when renamed to .xlsx), damaged files and password-protected workbooks are not opened; the editor and the tool say why. Workbooks larger than 8 MB are not opened by default, and the message shows how to raise that limit. Loading also stops when a part of the workbook grows beyond 100 MB unpacked.
Formula cells show the result saved in the file. A workbook last saved in Excel holds those results. A workbook whose formulas were written by a script and never opened and saved in a spreadsheet application may hold no saved results, and those cells then show 0 or nothing; ask the tool for formulas to see what the cells contain. The editor recalculates formulas after you change a cell; functions it cannot calculate are recalculated by Excel when the file is opened there.
Some charts, pivot tables and embedded objects may not be kept when you save, so keep a copy of workbooks that contain them. Rows can be inserted or deleted on sheets with up to 2,000 rows, in workbooks with up to 200,000 cells. Rows cannot be inserted or deleted on a sheet that contains an Excel table, a chart or data validation rules, or whose data a chart, pivot table or validation rule elsewhere in the workbook uses; every cell there can still be edited. Columns cannot be deleted. Dates typed in forms other than the ones above are refused instead of being stored as text.
The agent tool needs an IDE that includes the built-in MCP server, and it reads only files inside the open project.
The plugin makes no network connections and does not send your workbooks anywhere. The agent tool reads only files inside the open project and returns them only to the AI agent you connected. If an error occurs inside the plugin, the IDE may offer to send an error report to JetBrains Marketplace (or sends it automatically if you turned on automatic error reporting in the IDE); for the failures the plugin detects itself, the error text is removed first, so cell contents and file names are not included. See the Privacy Notice.
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