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sqly is a powerful command-line tool that can execute SQL against CSV, TSV, LTSV, and Microsoft Excel™ files. The sqly import those files into SQLite3 in-memory database.

The sqly has sqly-shell. You can interactively execute SQL with sql completion and command history. Of course, you can also execute SQL without running the sqly-shell.

# Works with compressed files!
sqly --sql "SELECT * FROM data" data.csv.gz
sqly --sql "SELECT * FROM logs WHERE level='ERROR'" logs.tsv.bz2

How to install

Use "go install"

go install github.com/nao1215/sqly@latest

Use homebrew

brew install nao1215/tap/sqly

Supported OS & go version

• Windows
• macOS
• Linux
• go1.24.0 or later

How to use

The sqly automatically imports CSV/TSV/LTSV/Excel files (including compressed versions) into the DB when you pass file paths or directory paths as arguments. You can also mix files and directories in the same command. DB table name is the same as the file name or sheet name (e.g., if you import user.csv, sqly command create the user table).

Note: If the filename contains characters that would cause SQL syntax errors (such as hyphens -, dots ., or other special characters), they are automatically replaced with underscores _. For example, bug-syntax-error.csv becomes table bug_syntax_error.

The sqly automatically determines the file format from the file extension, including compressed files.

Execute sql in terminal: --sql option

--sql option takes an SQL statement as an optional argument.

$ sqly --sql "SELECT user_name, position FROM user INNER JOIN identifier ON user.identifier = identifier.id" testdata/user.csv testdata/identifier.csv
+-----------+-----------+
| user_name | position  |
+-----------+-----------+
| booker12  | developrt |
| jenkins46 | manager   |
| smith79   | neet      |
+-----------+-----------+

Directory import

You can import entire directories containing supported files. The sqly automatically detects all CSV, TSV, LTSV, and Excel files (including compressed versions) in the directory and imports them:

# Import all files from a directory
$ sqly ./data_directory

# Mix files and directories
$ sqly file1.csv ./data_directory file2.tsv

# Use with --sql option
$ sqly ./data_directory --sql "SELECT * FROM users"

Interactive shell: .import command

In the sqly shell, you can use the .import command to import files or directories:

sqly:~/data$ .import ./csv_files
Successfully imported 3 tables from directory ./csv_files: [users products orders]

sqly:~/data$ .import file1.csv ./directory file2.tsv
# Imports file1.csv, all files from directory, and file2.tsv

sqly:~/data$ .tables
orders
products
users

Change output format

The sqly output sql query results in following formats:

• ASCII table format (default)
• CSV format (--csv option)
• TSV format (--tsv option)
• LTSV format (--ltsv option)

$ sqly --sql "SELECT * FROM user LIMIT 2" --csv testdata/user.csv 
user_name,identifier,first_name,last_name
booker12,1,Rachel,Booker
jenkins46,2,Mary,Jenkins

Run sqly shell

The sqly shell starts when you run the sqly command without the --sql option. When you execute sqly command with file path, the sqly-shell starts after importing the file into the SQLite3 in-memory database.

$ sqly 
sqly v0.10.0

enter "SQL query" or "sqly command that begins with a dot".
.help print usage, .exit exit sqly.

sqly:~/github/github.com/nao1215/sqly(table)$ 

The sqly shell functions similarly to a common SQL client (e.g., sqlite3 command or mysql command). The sqly shell has helper commands that begin with a dot. The sqly-shell also supports command history, and input completion.

The sqly-shell has the following helper commands:

sqly:~/github/github.com/nao1215/sqly(table)$ .help
        .cd: change directory
      .dump: dump db table to file in a format according to output mode (default: csv)
      .exit: exit sqly
    .header: print table header
      .help: print help message
    .import: import file(s) and/or directory(ies)
        .ls: print directory contents
      .mode: change output mode
       .pwd: print current working directory
    .tables: print tables

Output sql result to file

For linux user

The sqly can save SQL execution results to the file using shell redirection. The --csv option outputs SQL execution results in CSV format instead of table format.

$ sqly --sql "SELECT * FROM user" --csv testdata/user.csv > test.csv

For windows user

The sqly can save SQL execution results to the file using the --output option. The --output option specifies the destination path for SQL results specified in the --sql option.

$ sqly --sql "SELECT * FROM user" --output=test.csv testdata/user.csv 

Key Binding for sqly-shell

Key Binding	Description
Ctrl + A	Go to the beginning of the line (Home)
Ctrl + E	Go to the end of the line (End)
Ctrl + P	Previous command (Up arrow)
Ctrl + N	Next command (Down arrow)
Ctrl + F	Forward one character
Ctrl + B	Backward one character
Ctrl + D	Delete character under the cursor
Ctrl + H	Delete character before the cursor (Backspace)
Ctrl + W	Cut the word before the cursor to the clipboard
Ctrl + K	Cut the line after the cursor to the clipboard
Ctrl + U	Cut the line before the cursor to the clipboard
Ctrl + L	Clear the screen
TAB	Completion
↑	Previous command
↓	Next command

📋 Recent Changes

• Official documentation for users & developers: https://nao1215.github.io/sqly/
• Alternative tool created by the same developer: simple terminal UI for DBMS & local CSV/TSV/LTSV

New: Compressed File Support

sqly now supports compressed files! You can directly process:

• Gzip compressed files (.csv.gz, .tsv.gz, .ltsv.gz, .xlsx.gz)
• Bzip2 compressed files (.csv.bz2, .tsv.bz2, .ltsv.bz2, .xlsx.bz2)
• XZ compressed files (.csv.xz, .tsv.xz, .ltsv.xz, .xlsx.xz)
• Zstandard compressed files (.csv.zst, .tsv.zst, .ltsv.zst, .xlsx.zst)

Added Features

• CTE (Common Table Expressions) Support: Now supports WITH clauses for complex queries and recursive operations
• filesql Integration: Enhanced performance and functionality using the filesql library
• Improved Performance: Bulk insert operations with transaction batching for faster file processing
• Better Type Handling: Automatic type detection ensures proper numeric sorting and calculations
• Compressed File Support: Native support for .gz, .bz2, .xz, and .zst compressed files

Removed Features

• JSON Support: JSON file format support has been removed in favor of focusing on structured data formats (CSV, TSV, LTSV, Excel)
  • Use CSV export from JSON tools if you need to process JSON data with sqly
  • The removal allows for better optimization of the core file formats

Breaking Changes

• The --json flag has been removed
• JSON files (.json) are no longer supported as input
• Numeric formatting in output may differ slightly due to improved type detection

Benchmark

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 3400G with Radeon Vega Graphics
Execute:

SELECT * FROM `table` WHERE `Index` BETWEEN 1000 AND 2000 ORDER BY `Index` DESC LIMIT 1000

Records	Columns	Time per Operation	Memory Allocated per Operation	Allocations per Operation
100,000	12	1715818835 ns/op	441387928 B/op	4967183 allocs/op
1,000,000	9	11414332112 ns/op	2767580080 B/op	39131122 allocs/op

Altenative Tools

Name	Description
harelba/q	Run SQL directly on delimited files and multi-file sqlite databases
dinedal/textql	Execute SQL against structured text like CSV or TSV
noborus/trdsql	CLI tool that can execute SQL queries on CSV, LTSV, JSON, YAML and TBLN. Can output to various formats.
mithrandie/csvq	SQL-like query language for csv

Limitions (Not support)

• DDL such as CREATE
• DML such as GRANT
• TCL such as Transactions

Contributing

First off, thanks for taking the time to contribute! See CONTRIBUTING.md for more information. Contributions are not only related to development. For example, GitHub Star motivates me to develop!

How to develop

Please see the document, section "Document for developers".

When adding new features or fixing bugs, please write unit tests. The sqly is unit tested for all packages as the unit test tree map below shows.

Contact

If you would like to send comments such as "find a bug" or "request for additional features" to the developer, please use one of the following contacts.

• GitHub Issue

Libraries Used

sqly leverages powerful Go libraries to provide its functionality:

• filesql - Provides SQL database interface for CSV/TSV/LTSV/Excel files with automatic type detection and compressed file support
• prompt - Powers the interactive shell with SQL completion and command history features

LICENSE

The sqly project is licensed under the terms of MIT LICENSE.

Contributors ✨

Thanks goes to these wonderful people (emoji key):

CHIKAMATSU Naohiro 💻 📖

Add your contributions

This project follows the all-contributors specification. Contributions of any kind welcome!