We have already covered how Access can import and export data from an external source, now let’s cover how to import an entire table from an external source.

Make sure you are in the Tables view of the Database window. Click Insert à Table. When the New Table dialogue box appears, click Import Table and then click OK:

 

 

The Import dialogue box will appear. Here you can pick from a number of different input sources by using the Files of Type combo box such as: Excel, dBase, Lotus database applications, a Microsoft Outlook address book, text files, XML (Extensible Markup Language) files, and ODBC (Open Data Base Connectivity) Sources.

Whichever source from which you decide to import, you will see the Import Objects dialogue box. Click each object you want to import one at a time from the Tables tabs at the top (or click Select All to highlight all under a single tab):

 

 

Click OK and all of the selected tables will be imported to your database and will be displayed in the Tables object page of the Database window. Since you have imported the data (as opposed to linking it) you have full access to do whatever you like to the data. The source file will not be touched.