How to Import Bank Transaction 4Col to QuickBooks Online (2026 Guide)

Prepare your CSV file with exactly four columns: Date, Description, Credit, and Debit. Use MM/DD/YYYY for dates. Unlike the 3-column format, the Credit column holds deposit/income amounts and the Debit column holds payment/expense amounts. Both columns use positive values only. Remove all currency symbols and thousand separators from the amount columns.

Tip: For each row, only one of the Credit or Debit columns should have a value. Leave the other blank or zero.

In QuickBooks Online, go to Transactions > Bank Transactions from the left sidebar. Select the bank or credit card account you want to upload transactions to. If you are setting up a new account for manual uploads, you may need to add it first under Settings > Chart of Accounts.

Click the 'Link account' dropdown and select 'Upload from file'. On the upload screen, choose the manual upload option. This method works for CSV files that you have prepared or exported from your bank's website.

Drag and drop your CSV file into the upload area, or click the browse button to select it from your computer. QuickBooks reads the file and checks its basic structure. If the file format is accepted, you will proceed to the account selection step.

Use the dropdown menu to select which QuickBooks bank or credit card account will receive the uploaded transactions. Double-check that you have selected the correct account, as this cannot be changed after the upload is complete. Click Continue.

QuickBooks asks formatting questions about your file. Confirm that the first row is a header row. When asked how many columns contain amounts, select 'two' to indicate separate Credit and Debit columns. Select your date format (MM/DD/YYYY). Then map each column: Date to Date, Description to Description, Credit to the credit/deposit field, and Debit to the debit/payment field.

QuickBooks shows a preview of the parsed transactions. Verify that credits appear as deposits and debits appear as expenses. If the amounts are inverted, go back and swap the Credit/Debit column mappings. Select the transactions to import and click Continue to finalize the upload.

Uploaded transactions appear in your Banking feed under the 'For Review' tab. QuickBooks treats these exactly like bank-feed transactions. Review each transaction, assign a category (expense or income account), and click Add to record it or Match to link it with an existing transaction. This step is required to move transactions from the review queue into your books.