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CSV with coordinates

CSV is useful because almost every system can create/read it. It has no built-in GIS geometry or CRS metadata, so those facts must be documented separately.

Good point schema​

id,name,x_or_longitude,y_or_latitude,crs,source,observed_date,notes

If every row uses the same CRS, storing the CRS once in a README/metadata file is cleaner than repeating it.

Common failures​

  • latitude and longitude swapped
  • NZTM eastings treated as longitude
  • Excel removes leading zeros from identifiers
  • long IDs shown in scientific notation
  • dates silently reformatted
  • macrons damaged by wrong text encoding
  • commas inside notes break badly produced CSV

Use UTF-8 and quote fields where needed.

Import to QGIS​

Use Add Delimited Text Layer, choose the coordinate fields and assign the CRS that the numbers actually use. Then export to GeoPackage if the layer becomes part of a durable project.

Last reviewed: 26 August 2026

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