If your current app can export a CSV file, Game Tracker can read it. One row per game is all it takes, and you decide what each of your columns means: that step happens once, on one screen, and Game Tracker fills in most of it for you.
Time needed: about ten minutes, including the minute you spend matching columns.
Step 1. Export a CSV from your old app
Look for Export, Backup, Download your data or Save as CSV, usually in the app’s settings. Choose CSV if you are offered a choice of formats.
Save the file somewhere you can reach from your device: Save to Files, iCloud Drive, or mail it to yourself.
What a usable file looks like. The first line names the columns, and each line after it is one game:
Title,Platform,My Rating,Progress,Finished,Notes
Hollow Knight,Nintendo Switch,9,100,2024-03-11,Best 15 euros ever spent
Elden Ring,PS5,10,64,,Still stuck on Radahn
Hades,PC,8,100,2023-11-02,Your column names do not have to match anything. Names like My Rating and Finished are fine: naming them is exactly what step 3 is for.
Step 2. Start the import in Game Tracker
- Open Game Tracker.
- Go to Settings › Import.
- Tap Choose a file and pick your CSV.
Game Tracker looks at your column names and says which app it thinks wrote the file. If it recognizes nothing, it asks. Pick the app your file came from if it is offered, or choose to match the columns yourself.
Step 3. Say which column holds what
This is the only screen that asks anything of you, and it takes a minute.
Each line is one thing a game can hold: title, rating, platforms, progress, and so on. Beside each is the column Game Tracker thinks holds it, worked out from your column names. Usually you are confirming rather than answering.
- Read down the list. Fix anything that landed in the wrong place.
- Tap a line to change it and pick one of your columns. One column can only serve one
field: give it to a second field and it leaves the first. - Leave out what you do not want. Every field is optional. An unmatched column simply
does not come across, which is also how you skip a column you would rather not bring. - Point at your titles. Either the title column or an IGDB ID column has to be
matched. Nothing can be imported without one of them, and the screen will not let you
continue until one is set.
A column nobody matches is a column nobody reads, and your file will not warn you: as far as it is concerned, nothing is missing. If your ratings matter to you, check that line before moving on.
The mapping reference lists every field, the column names recognized for each, and the values those columns should hold.
Step 4. Wait for the lookup
Game Tracker looks your games up in IGDB, the games catalog, in blocks rather than one at a time. This is the only step that needs an internet connection.
Anything Game Tracker knows about a game comes from here: cover, release date, genres, companies and the platforms it runs on. A row that carries an IGDB ID is matched exactly. A row with only a title is matched by title and year, which is why some rows come back asking you to choose.
Step 5. Check what will happen, then confirm
You get a list of every row and what will become of it.
| What you see | What it means |
|---|---|
| Importing | Coming in as a new game. |
| Already in your library | You have it already. Choose whether your file fills in the blanks or replaces what is there. |
| Needs a look | Several games go by that name. Tap the row and pick yours. |
| Skipped | The row will not be imported. |
You can change any row, and you can set the choice for all of them at once. Then confirm. Nothing is saved until you do.
Step 6. Read the summary
You get a summary: games added, games you already had that were updated, and anything that did not work. Save it if you want to keep it.
Rows that could not become a game come back as a CSV with your columns plus one called Import problem saying why. Fix them there and import that file on its own.
What to expect from your games
A row with an IGDB ID arrives complete. The catalog fills in everything except what you wrote yourself.
A game the catalog has never heard of arrives as your own, built from what your file says: title, dates, summary and images if you provided them. It will not gain a cover later, because it is not linked to a catalog entry.
If the catalog cannot be reached at all, those rows are left out and the summary says so, rather than filling your library with empty games. Try again on a better connection.
Three fields expect particular words
Release status, formats and platforms hold words Game Tracker has its own vocabulary for. It is forgiving about how you write them: capitals, spaces, hyphens and accents make no difference, so Early Access, early-access and EARLY_ACCESS are the same word. Common synonyms work too: disc and boxed mean physical, download means digital, PS4 means PlayStation 4.
Nothing is dropped in silence. A status or a format that cannot be placed is named on the review screen, before you import. A platform that cannot be placed is named in the summary at the end, and the game comes in without it rather than not at all.
The full lists are in the mapping reference.
If something does not work
Game Tracker could not read the file. It may be empty, or saved as something other than CSV. Export it again, choosing CSV.
A whole column did not come across. It was probably left unmatched in step 3. Run the import again and check that line.
Ratings came in too high or too low. Game Tracker reads the scale from your file as a whole: nothing above 5 is read as out of 5, nothing above 10 as out of 10, anything higher as out of 100. A file rated out of 10 where nobody ever went above 5 is read as out of 5. See the mapping reference.
Still stuck? Email support@gametracker.cloud with your file and the summary.
Coming from Gamery?
There is nothing to match: Game Tracker recognizes those files on sight. See Moving from Gamery.