Convert W-2 Forms to Excel

Drop in any W-2 PDF — current year or prior year, employee or copy-A — and get a clean Excel file with employer name, employer EIN, employee SSN, wages, federal withholding, state and local withholding, Box 12 codes (D, DD, W, AA, BB), and retirement plan indicators.

Convert your W-2s — free

W-2s look simple — until you have a stack of them

A single W-2 is straightforward, but tax preparers handle stacks of them every busy season. Working couples have two each. Multi-job clients have three or four. Multi-year clean-ups can mean a dozen historical W-2s per filer. Each one has 20 numbered boxes plus a Box 12 with letter codes (D for 401(k), DD for employer health, W for HSA contributions, AA for Roth 401(k), BB for Roth 403(b)) that tax software needs in the right slots.

Lenders verifying applicant income for mortgage or auto loans need 2 years of W-2s per applicant — sometimes from different employers. Underwriters who type Box 1 wages, Box 2 federal withholding, and Box 5 Medicare wages by hand into the income model are one transposed digit away from a bad lending decision.

One row per W-2 — every box, every Box 12 code

PDFExcel reads W-2s by structure. Each W-2 becomes one row with employer name, employer EIN, employee name, employee SSN, control number, all 20 numbered boxes, and Box 12 codes parsed into separate columns (Box 12a code + amount, 12b code + amount, etc.). State and local withholding for multiple states extract as separate rows or columns depending on your downstream use.

Mix W-2s for multiple years and multiple filers in one upload — the workbook keeps each row tagged with tax year and employer EIN. Built-in OCR handles client-provided scans and faxed copies (still common for older years). Drop the export into Lacerte, ProSeries, Drake, UltraTax, or directly into a lender's income-verification model.

Fields you can pull

  • Tax Year
  • Employer Name
  • Employer EIN
  • Employee Name
  • Employee SSN
  • Control Number
  • Box 1 Wages
  • Box 2 Federal Withholding
  • Box 3-6 Social Security & Medicare
  • Box 12a-d Codes + Amounts
  • Box 13 Retirement Plan / Statutory Employee
  • State Wages + Withholding
  • Local Wages + Withholding

The model knows that Box 12 code D is a traditional 401(k), DD is employer-paid health (informational only), and W is HSA. Trained on real W-2s from every major payroll provider — ADP, Gusto, Paychex, QuickBooks Payroll, OnPay, Rippling, Justworks, Square.

Why preparers and lenders pick PDFExcel for W-2s

Most tax-document tools either need an integration with each employer's payroll provider or charge per-form. PDFExcel reads any W-2 PDF on the first upload — and you can batch a whole client envelope or a year of lender stubs in a minute.

  • Knows every W-2 layout. ADP, Gusto, Paychex, QuickBooks Payroll, OnPay, Rippling, Justworks, Square Payroll, plus state-specific W-2s and prior-year W-2s with older formatting.
  • Free to start, no credit card. 10 documents free every month. Most personal returns (2-4 W-2s per filer) fit easily in the free tier.
  • No payroll-provider integration. Works on any W-2 PDF regardless of issuer. No API connection, no per-employer setup, no IT lift.
  • Tax data deleted after processing. W-2s contain SSNs and wage data — files are processed in memory and deleted immediately. Never stored, never shared, never used to train AI.

How it works

  1. Upload your W-2s. Drop in one form or a stack as a ZIP. Native PDFs and scanned client copies both work. Up to 20 MB per file.
  2. Pick the boxes you need. Box 1 wages, Box 2 federal withholding, Box 12 codes, state withholding to start. Add specific boxes for retirement-plan or multi-state filing scenarios.
  3. Download the spreadsheet. Excel or CSV with one row per W-2. Drop into your tax software's W-2 entry screen, lender income model, or wage-verification spreadsheet.

What a working couple's W-2 stack looks like in Excel

Multiple filers, multiple employers, multiple years — all in one workbook. Box 12 codes extracted as separate columns.

# Year Employer Employee Box 1 Wages Box 2 Fed WH Box 12 D 401(k) State WH
1 2024 Acme Corp S. Patel $132,400.00 $24,612.00 $13,240.00 $8,144.00
2 2024 Pacific Health Systems L. Patel $48,200.00 $6,124.00 $2,892.00 $1,884.00
3 2023 Acme Corp S. Patel $118,800.00 $21,300.00 $11,880.00 $7,128.00
4 2023 Northern Hospital Group L. Patel $42,100.00 $5,210.00 $2,526.00 $1,684.00

Built for tax preparers, lenders, and HR ops

Tax preparers handling individual returns, mortgage and auto-loan underwriters verifying income, HR teams reconciling year-end W-2s against payroll provider reports, attorneys handling wage disputes.

A tax preparer in March

Married couple, 4 W-2s between them across 2024. Batch upload, copy box values directly into UltraTax. Wage-entry portion of the return drops from 30 minutes to 5.

A mortgage underwriter

Applicant submits 2 years of W-2s plus pay stubs. Convert all to Excel, copy Box 1 wages and Box 2 withholding into the income-verification model. Income calculation done in minutes instead of half an hour.

An HR team after year-end

1,200 employees received W-2s. HR converts all to Excel and reconciles Box 1 wages against the payroll provider's annual register before responding to employee corrections.

Pricing

  • Free — 10 documents / month, no credit card
  • Starter $69/mo — 50 documents, $1.50 per extra
  • Pro $199/mo — 200 documents, $0.99 per extra
  • Business $699/mo — 1,000 documents, $0.59 per extra

Frequently asked questions

Does it extract Box 12 codes correctly?

Yes. Each Box 12 entry (12a, 12b, 12c, 12d) parses into a code + amount pair. The model knows that D is traditional 401(k), DD is employer-paid health (informational), W is HSA, AA is Roth 401(k), BB is Roth 403(b), etc. — and keeps them in their respective columns.

Will it handle multi-state W-2s?

Yes. W-2s with multiple state-wage entries (Box 16) and multiple state-withholding entries (Box 17) extract each state as a separate row or as separate columns, depending on your export preference. Same for local wages (Box 18-20).

Is this really free?

10 documents per month, free, forever. Most personal returns (2-4 W-2s per filer) fit easily in the free tier. Plans from $69/month for 50 documents — for tax preparers handling busy season volume.

Does it work on scanned or older W-2s?

Yes. Built-in OCR runs automatically when there's no embedded text layer. Older W-2 layouts (pre-2020) and scanned client copies of historical W-2s extract correctly.

Will the output import into Lacerte / ProSeries / Drake / UltraTax?

We export CSVs that those systems' W-2 entry screens accept via copy-paste. Most preparers paste box values column-by-column. We don't have a direct API integration.

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