# Historian CSV Export Timestamp Conversion to Excel

**URL:** <https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/historian-csv-export-timestamp-conversion-to-excel/103360>\
**Category:** Ignition\
**Tags:** ignition81, perspective\
**Created:** [March 6, 2025, 10:02pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/historian-csv-export-timestamp-conversion-to-excel/103360 "2025-03-06T22:02:39Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Maxton\_Lemon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/db5fbb/32.png) [@Maxton\_Lemon](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/Maxton_Lemon)\
**Post date:** [March 6, 2025, 10:02pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/historian-csv-export-timestamp-conversion-to-excel/103360/1 "2025-03-06T22:02:39Z")

</div>

When I export the trended data from the Perspective Historian to a .csv file, it shows the time as a 13-digit number that does not seem to easily correlate to the correct date/time of the data (it's not just something like yyymmddhhmmss). I figure this is due to how the Ignition dateTime data type is formatted. Is there a way to convert the 13-digit number to the correct date-time in a third-party program like Excel?

The end goal is to be able to compare the data in the Ignition historian with a secondary database the data is being sent to in order to ensure that both sets of data match.

For example: a timestamp that should be between 9:41PM-9:42PM 03/06/2025 came out as 1741297277000 when I opened the .csv file in Excel.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![ryan.white](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/ryan.white/32/73193_2.png) [@ryan.white](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/ryan.white)\
**Post date:** [March 6, 2025, 10:03pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/historian-csv-export-timestamp-conversion-to-excel/103360/2 "2025-03-06T22:03:44Z")

</div>

Timestamps in Ignition are stored as milliseconds since the epoch.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![pturmel](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/pturmel/32/3295_2.png) [@pturmel](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/pturmel)\
**Post date:** [March 6, 2025, 10:04pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/historian-csv-export-timestamp-conversion-to-excel/103360/3 "2025-03-06T22:04:14Z")

</div>

> [@ryan.white](#):
>
> as milliseconds **UTC** since the epoch

For the record.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Maxton\_Lemon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/db5fbb/32.png) [@Maxton\_Lemon](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/Maxton_Lemon)\
**Post date:** [March 6, 2025, 10:11pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/historian-csv-export-timestamp-conversion-to-excel/103360/4 "2025-03-06T22:11:59Z")

</div>

Sweet, thanks for the help.

As a side question, does the Perspective Historian interpolate data points to show a continuous graph? I also noticed that the .csv has **SIGNIFICANTLY** more data points than we actually collected during an interval.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![pturmel](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/pturmel/32/3295_2.png) [@pturmel](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/pturmel)\
**Post date:** [March 6, 2025, 10:15pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/historian-csv-export-timestamp-conversion-to-excel/103360/5 "2025-03-06T22:15:44Z")

</div>

The Perspective Power Table component has a number of per-pen historian settings that apply.

Ignition's historian can be told to supply "as-stored" data, but there are quirks that make that difficult to chart out of the box.

Consider scripting a dedicated historian query to get exactly the data you wish to export, and deliver it with `system.perspective.download()`.