Guide
How to Make a Word Cloud From a CSV or Excel File
If your words already live in a spreadsheet — a keyword research export, survey results, a list of votes — CloudMyWords can size each word by a real number instead of just counting repetitions.
Why weight matters
A plain word cloud sizes words by how often they repeat in a text. That works for an article or a speech, but it doesn't work for a spreadsheet where each row is a distinct term that appears exactly once — like a list of keywords. In that case, repetition tells you nothing; what matters is the number next to each word.
That's what the weight column is for: the bigger the number, the bigger the word — regardless of how many times it appears in your file.
A common example: keyword research
Export your keyword list from a tool like Ahrefs, Google Search Console or Keyword Planner. It typically gives you a column of keywords and a column of monthly search volume. Upload that export directly:
- Click "Upload a file" and select the .csv or .xlsx export.
- In the "Choose the columns" window, set the keyword column as "Word / term column".
- Set your volume column (or any numeric column, like traffic potential or a difficulty score) as "Weight column".
- Click "Generate word cloud" — the keywords people search for the most are now the biggest words in the cloud, at a glance.
It's not limited to SEO data — the same steps work for survey scores, product ratings, poll votes, budget line items, or any spreadsheet with a word and a number next to it.
A worked example
Say your export looks like this:
| Keyword | Search volume |
|---|---|
| word cloud generator | 26,000 |
| free word cloud maker | 7,400 |
| word cloud for powerpoint | 150 |
| word cloud from excel | 60 |
Set "Keyword" as the word column and "Search volume" as the weight column, and "word cloud generator" is drawn dramatically bigger than "word cloud from excel" — proportional to the real gap in search volume, not to how many times each phrase happens to appear in your file (here, once each).
If you don't have a weight column
That's fine — just leave "Weight column" set to "None — count repetitions". Word size will be based on how many times each term appears in your file instead.
Tips for weighting data well
- Skewed data can flatten everything else. If one keyword has 20x the volume of the rest, it can make every other word tiny by comparison. Set "Weight scale" to logarithmic or square root (in "Customize style options") to compress that gap while keeping the same ranking.
- Any numeric column works, not just volume. Traffic potential, a difficulty score, a vote count, an average rating — whichever number represents what you actually want to highlight.
- Trim the list first if it's very long. A spreadsheet with thousands of rows will still work, but the cloud gets easier to read if you sort by your weight column and keep the top few hundred before uploading.
- Google Sheets exports work too. Download a Google Sheet as .xlsx or .csv (File → Download) and upload that file the same way.
Supported file types
CloudMyWords reads .csv, .xls and .xlsx files directly in your browser — nothing is uploaded to a server, and the file never leaves your device. A preview of your first rows is shown before you generate anything, so you can confirm you picked the right columns.
Frequently asked questions
Does this work with a Google Sheets export?
Yes. Download the sheet as .xlsx or .csv from Google Sheets (File → Download), then upload that file the same way as any other spreadsheet.
Is there a limit on how many rows I can upload?
There's no fixed limit, but very large files (tens of thousands of rows) take longer to process and produce a cloud crowded with tiny, unreadable words. Sorting by your weight column and keeping the top few hundred rows usually gives a better-looking result anyway.
Can I use more than one weight column?
Not directly — only one column can be the weight at a time. If you want to combine two metrics (say, volume and traffic potential), calculate a single combined score in your spreadsheet first, then use that column as the weight.
Is my spreadsheet uploaded to a server?
No. The file is read and processed entirely in your browser — it's never transmitted anywhere, which also means it's safe to use with data you wouldn't want to hand to a third-party service.
Related guides
- How to make a word cloud — the full walkthrough, including styling and download.
- Add a word cloud to PowerPoint or Google Slides.
Have a spreadsheet ready?
Upload it and generate your word cloud