Facing Issues with CSV Import?

There are two distinct types of issues you may encounter when using the CSV upload feature in the UAE Table widget:

1. “File Could Not Be Opened” — a server-side file access error (covered first below)
2. Incorrectly formatted CSV — causes malformed or missing table data (covered in the second section)

Make sure you identify which error you are seeing before following the steps below.

• For MAC Users
• For Windows Users
• For Google Sheets users (recommended)

File Could Not Be Opened

If you see the message “File could not be opened. Check the file’s permissions to make sure it’s readable by your server”, this is a server-side file permissions issue — not a problem with your CSV’s formatting or content.

This error appears when the UAE Table widget can locate your uploaded file but the web server does not have permission to read it.

What to Check

1. Upload via WordPress Media Library

The CSV must be uploaded directly through the widget’s upload field, which uses the WordPress Media Library. Linking to an external URL or a file outside the uploads directory will not work.

2. Confirm the File Has a .csv Extension

The plugin checks the file extension before attempting to open it. A file named “data.CSV” or “data.txt” will fail even if the content is valid CSV. Rename the file to use a lowercase .csv extension before uploading.

3. Check File Permissions on Your Server

The uploaded file must be readable by your web server process. In most cases, WordPress handles this automatically. However, on some shared or managed hosting environments, files in wp-content/uploads/ may be assigned restrictive permissions.

To resolve:

• Contact your hosting provider and ask them to confirm that files in wp-content/uploads/ are readable by the web server (PHP process).
• If you have server access, check that the file permission is at least 644.

4. Re-upload the File

Sometimes a failed or interrupted upload leaves a corrupted file on the server. Delete the existing file from the Media Library and upload a fresh copy

Still Seeing the Error?

If the steps above do not resolve the issue, please reach out to our support team with the following information:

• Your hosting provider name
• WordPress version, UAE version, Elementor version
• A screenshot of the error as it appears on the front end

Incorrectly Formatted CSV

For MAC Users

File that is created with Numbers app can be exported as CSV as shown below:

Step 1 – Open a file with Numbers and click on File -> Export To -> CSV

Step 2 – Set the following options:

2.1 Uncheck “Include table names“
2.2 Set Text Encoding as Unicode(UTF-8)

For Windows Users

If you have a file created with MS Office then below are the steps to export the file as CSV:

Step 1 – From the top bar, click on Data menu.
Step 2 – Click on the From Text icon.
Step 3 – Go to the location of the file that you want to import. Click on the filename and then click on the Import button. The Text Import Wizard – Step 1 or 3 windows will now appear on the screen.
Step 4 – Choose the file type 65001: Unicode (UTF-8) from the drop-down list that appears next to File origin. Click on the Next button.
Step 5 – It will display the ‘Text Import Wizard – Step 2 or 3’ window. Select the Comma delimiter. Click on the Next button.
Step 6 – Select Column data format as general and click on Finish button.

For Google Sheets users

This is the easy and sure way to export CSV files. It works well even with your old files. Just import your old files with Google Sheets from File > Import and download it again. You can create/upload file to Google Sheets and then download them as CSV using following steps –

Click on File -> Download as -> Comma-separated values (.csv, current sheet)

You can even import CSV files to Google Sheets that are now working with the Table Widget, download them again and import to the widget. 

After successfully exporting CSV files, upload it with UAE Table widget to create a table. Refer a link here.