Importing & Exporting: FAQ

A blank Record ID doesn't fail the import, but it changes the outcome: without an ID to match against, Insightly can't tell your row apart from an existing record and treats it as new instead of updating one. See Importing Data Guide, Preparing your file.

Match the Record ID in your file to the Record ID already on the record in Insightly, and choose Update Existing Records as your import action. Record ID is required for this; record names will not match reliably on their own. See Importing from external sources, Bulk updating existing records through import.

Export the corresponding records from Insightly first to get their IDs, then add those IDs to your outside file before importing it back. If the file already came from Insightly, the Record ID column is already there. See Importing from external sources, Getting Record IDs into the file.

Export them from Google as a CSV and import that file, rather than using the direct connection. The CSV route gives you full control over field mapping, including custom fields, and is faster. See Importing from external sources.

Add New Records adds new records and skips anything Insightly recognizes as a duplicate. Update Existing Records updates records matching the Record ID in your file and skips everything else. There's also a combined option that does both at once. See Importing Data Guide, Running the import.

Not by default. If you haven't chosen to update existing records, or your file has no Record ID, Insightly checks for duplicates before importing and skips anything flagged, listing skipped records in the completion email. See Importing Data Guide, Duplicate checks.

Recently imported records can be viewed as a set and deleted together from the Recent Imports section of the object menu. That's the recovery path if an import goes wrong. See Importing Data Guide, After importing.

Export from the source account and import into the target, after setting up users and customizations there first. Only main records transfer; emails, file attachments, notes, comments, events, most links between records, and Google Drive file links are lost in the move. See Importing from external sources, Transferring data between Insightly accounts.

Contacts, Leads, Organizations, Opportunities, Projects, Tasks, Custom Object Records, Products, Price Books, Quotes, Phone Calls, Prospects, Tickets, and the notes attached to several of those. See Exporting Data.

Go to the object, click Show Sidebar, and click Export under Import/Export. The CSV arrives by email, or downloads from the bell icon; download links expire after 30 days. See Exporting Data, Exporting all of an object's data.

Yes. Narrow the list with a filter, a saved list view, a recent import, or a tag, then check the box above the records to select everything currently shown before exporting. See Exporting Data, Exporting a subset.

XML export exists mainly to back up links and relationships between records, or to share data with other applications. XML files cannot be imported back into Insightly directly; converting to CSV first makes some, but not all, of that data importable. See Exporting Data, XML export.

Yes. Build one CSV containing the required fields for both objects, for example organizations and their linked contacts, and import it. Tasks, contacts, organizations, leads, opportunities, projects, prospects, and custom objects can all be used this way. This keeps both sides updated together rather than importing each object separately and re-linking them by hand afterward. See Importing Data Guide, Importing linked records.

Opening a CSV directly in Excel can silently reformat dates and other values, especially outside U.S. locales, since Insightly exports dates as month/day/year and Excel can misread them. Save the file first, then open it through Excel's Text Import Wizard and set each date column's format explicitly, rather than double-clicking the file. See Opening a CSV in Excel to fix formatting.