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Exporting writes a Collection’s Items to a CSV file you can open in a spreadsheet, edit, and upload back. Open the Collection, use the Download / Upload List menu above the items table, and pick one of the two download options. This is the Item list. It is not the print list a print batch produces — that file describes Links and codes for a printer and contains different columns.

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The two options

Download Visible Columns exports exactly the columns currently shown in the items table. Use it when you want a working file for a specific job — a stocktake sheet, a list to send someone — and want to keep the columns you already arranged on screen. Download All Columns (Backup) exports every field configured on the Collection, in the order the fields are arranged, including fields that happen to be empty on every Item. It also always includes the Destination URL column and the app-link fallback columns, so a restore can seed those again. Use it as a backup or when you plan to edit and re-import.

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The export follows what you are looking at

Whatever search, filters and sort order the items table has applied carries into the file. Filter to one site and you export that site. Clear the filters first if you want everything. Filtering affects rows, not columns, and pagination does not apply: every matching Item is exported, not just the page you can see.

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What the file looks like

  • id is always the first column. That is what makes a re-import update the same Items instead of creating duplicates, so keep it if you plan to upload the file back.
  • Headers use each field’s configured label — a field relabeled to “Plant No.” exports under that heading. If two fields would produce the same heading, the second falls back to its field key so no two columns collide. Import recognizes either form.
  • List values, such as Tags, are joined with ; in a single cell.
  • Dates export as ISO YYYY-MM-DD, regardless of how they are displayed on screen, and yes/no fields export as true or false.
  • Fields no longer on the Collection are left out. Data left behind by a deleted field is not exported.
  • The Item photo is never exported. Import ignores it too, so there is nothing to round-trip.
The file is named after the Collection and the date — Heavy_Equipment_2026-08-18.csv — with any character that is not a letter, number, hyphen or underscore replaced by an underscore.

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Exporting an empty Collection gives you a template

A Collection with no Items still exports a file with the full header row when you choose the backup option. That is a convenient starting template: download it, fill in the rows, and import it.

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One thing to fix before re-importing

Values beginning with =, +, -, @, | or a tab are exported with a leading apostrophe, so a spreadsheet cannot execute them as formulas. The apostrophe is not removed on import, because QRtub cannot tell it apart from an apostrophe you meant to store. The practical consequence: a negative number such as -40 exports as '-40, and re-importing it into a number field is rejected as an invalid number for that row. Strip the apostrophe from those cells before uploading.