Export leave data

Exporting leave data in absentify can be incredibly useful for tracking, analyzing, and reporting user absences. Whether you’re a department head or in HR, knowing how to pull accurate leave records for specific time periods is crucial. absentify offers two export formats: Excel (XLSX) for structured data reports and Calendar PDFs (ZIP) for printable calendars.

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Export format

Before starting an export, select the Format at the top of the export form:

• Excel (XLSX): a structured spreadsheet with five sheets (Allowance, Leave, Absences per day, Adjustments, Rules). Best for payroll, HR reporting, and data analysis.
• Calendar PDFs (ZIP): printable calendars. Exactly one person under Employees, with no Departments selected, downloads as a single PDF. More than one person, any departments, or a mix arrive as a ZIP with one PDF per active user.

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Recent exports

absentify runs Excel exports and ZIP calendar PDF exports as background jobs. You set them up under New export, select Create export, and the job appears under Recent exports on the same page. If you start an export that is already running, absentify points you at the running row instead of starting a second job. A calendar PDF for exactly one person under Employees, with no Departments selected, is not a job. It downloads in the browser right away and does not appear in the list. The list shows the exports of all admins in your organization, newest first, with the columns Export, Period, Requested by, Status and Actions. In the Export column, calendar PDF rows show who the file covers: the person’s name, how many employees you selected, a department name, how many departments you selected, or a mix. Excel rows show All departments or the department you picked. A job moves from Preparing… to Ready, and you then select Download to get the file. Finished exports stay available for download for 24 hours under Recent exports. After that the row shows Expired, and you select Run again to create the same export again. A failed job shows Something went wrong. If it ran too long, narrow the period and create it again. You do not have to stay on the page. absentify emails the admin who started the export whenever it runs longer than a minute. The email does not contain the file or a download link. Select Open your exports in it to return to this page, then select Download on the row. If you are working elsewhere in absentify, you also get a message with a Download action as soon as your export is ready.

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Excel export

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Step-by-step: how to export leave data to Excel

This guide walks you through the steps to export leave data and explains what to expect from the exported Excel file.

1. Access export feature Head over to the Settings > Export section in your absentify dashboard.
2. Select format Choose Excel (XLSX) from the Format selector.
3. Select a time range Select the exact time frame for your export. Use the Year | Month | Range toggle at the top of the form:
   • Year — export data for an entire fiscal year.
   • Month — export data for a specific month (paid plan required).
   • Range — pick a custom start and end date with the calendar picker (paid plan required). This is useful for payroll reconciliation or any period that does not align with a calendar month.
4. Choose Export for After selecting the time frame, use Export for to choose All departments or one department. Filtering to one department requires a paid plan. On the Free plan, only All departments is available. Excel cannot pick individual users.
   If a user was part of a department at the time of the leave request but has since been moved to another department, they will not show up in the export for their previous department.
5. Start the export Once you set the desired parameters, select Create export. absentify builds the workbook in the background and lists it under Recent exports, where you select Download as soon as the status is Ready. The workbook contains five sheets, each packed with relevant details.

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Export options

In absentify, you can export leave data on a yearly, monthly, or custom date range basis, with the option to filter either by specific departments or company-wide. The available export dates go as far back as the creation date of your workspace.

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What’s included in the exported Excel file?

The exported Excel file contains five sheets:

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1. Allowance

This sheet provides an overview of user allowances and leave taken for the selected time frame. The columns included are:

• User Id: The user’s app-specific identifier.
• Custom Id: The user’s custom identifier defined by your organization.
• Name: The full name of the user for whom the leave request was created.
• Email: The email address of the user associated with the leave request.
• Status: Indicates whether the user is active, inactive, or archived.
• Employment start date: The official start date of the user’s employment with your organization.
• Employment end date: The user’s end date of employment, if one is set in their profile, regardless of whether the user is active, inactive, or archived.
• Department: If the user is assigned to multiple departments, they are separated by commas. If a single department was selected during export, only users from that department are included.
• Allowance: Displays the allowance type.
• Allowance unit: Indicates whether the allowance is measured in days or minutes.
• Ignore allowance limit: Indicates (true or false) whether the user is allowed to exceed their allocated allowance. This setting is defined in the configuration of the corresponding allowance type.
• Rule: The name of the allowance rule that applied to the user. In the current fiscal year this is the rule in effect today. In past and future years it is the rule in effect on the first day of the fiscal year. Without an assignment, Rule, Rule valid from, and Rule valid until stay empty.
• Rule valid from and Rule valid until: The period this person is covered. Rule valid from is the first day they actually accrue, so their employment start date if they joined after the assignment began. Rule valid until is the last day the rule applied and stays empty for an open-ended assignment.

The following columns apply to the selected fiscal year. Except for Expires on, which holds a date, they are all shown in the same absence unit (days or minutes) as the corresponding allowance type.

• Carryover: The amount of allowance carried over from the previous year into the selected year.
• Allowance (from rule): The amount the allowance rule granted for the year, before any manual corrections.
• Adjustments: The net total of manual adjustments for the year, positive or negative. Compensatory time off is reported separately and is not included here.
• Effective allowance: Allowance (from rule) plus Adjustments. This is the figure the user sees as their entitlement, and the value the API and webhooks report as allowance.
• Compensatory time off: The total amount of compensatory time off credited to the user.
• Taken: The amount of allowance that has been used by the user.
• Remaining: The remaining allowance available to the user.
• Will expire: The amount that expires next. When a date is known, this is the exact amount for that date, not a combined total of later expiries. When no date is stored, the cell still shows the remaining amount that will expire.
• Expires on: The deadline for the amount in Will expire, using the same next-expiry date as the year-table tooltip. The cell stays empty when there is no dated next expiry.
• Expired: The amount that has already expired in the selected year.

Following these columns, each leave type configured in your organization is listed as its own column. If a leave type has been deleted, it will be labeled with (deleted) in parentheses. The corresponding cells display the total number of units taken for each leave type.

Monthly and range export differences

For monthly and custom date range exports, the structure is the same, except the following columns are excluded:

• Carryover
• Allowance (from rule)
• Adjustments
• Effective allowance
• Compensatory time off
• Taken
• Remaining
• Will expire
• Expires on
• Expired

The Rule, Rule valid from, and Rule valid until columns are still included, so you can see which policy applied during the period. Instead, a column titled Deducted from allowance is included. This column reflects the total number of absence units deducted from the user’s allowance for the selected period. For range exports, the allowance columns reference the year of the range’s start date.

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2. Leave

This sheet contains detailed leave request data based on leave types. It includes the following columns:

• ID: The app’s unique identifier for the leave request.
• User Id: The user’s app-specific identifier.
• Custom Id: The user’s custom identifier defined by your organization.
• Name: The full name of the user for whom the leave request was created.
• Email: The email address of the user associated with the leave request.
• Leave type: The type of leave that was requested.
• Start date: The scheduled start date of the leave request. For hour-based leave types, the start time of day is also included.
• Start At: The scheduled start time of the request. For day-based leave types, this shows as morning or afternoon.
• End date: The scheduled end date of the leave request. For hour-based leave types, the end time of day is also included.
• End At: The scheduled end time of the request. For day-based leave types, this shows as lunch break or end of day.
• Workday absence duration: The deducted amount for the request. Day-based leave is in days. Hour-based leave is in minutes. The unit is the same as Allowance unit. The figure follows the user’s schedule on each date, including member-specific schedules, public holidays, half-day start and end, and Deduct full day. Carry-over used by the request is part of this amount, not added on top.
• Duration: For day-based leave, the calendar span of the request (including weekends and public holidays in the date range). For hour-based leave, the total elapsed minutes between start and end, including time outside the work schedule.
• Allowance unit: Displays the unit (Days or Minutes) defined for the leave type.
• Reason: If provided by the user, the reason for the request is shown here.
• Created at: The timestamp when the request was created.
• Created by: The user who created the request. This may differ from the “Name”, “Email”, and “User ID” columns, which refer to the person for whom the request was created.
• Status: Displays whether the request is pending, approved, declined, or canceled.
• Approval process: Indicates the sequence or structure of the approval flow.
• Approved at: If approved, the date and time of approval.
• Approved by: The approver(s) who approved the request.
• Cancelled at: If canceled, the date and time of cancellation.
• Cancelled by: The user who canceled the request.
• Cancel reason: If the request was canceled, this field shows the reason provided by the user who performed the cancellation.
• Declined at: If declined, the date and time of rejection.
• Declined by: The user who declined the request.
• Decline reason: The reason entered at the time of decline by the user who rejected the request.
• Take from allowance: Indicates (true or false) whether the request deducted from the user’s allowance quota.
• Allowance type: If Take from allowance is true, the name of the associated allowance type will be shown.

Monthly and range export differences

Absences spanning multiple months or across the selected range: If an absence request extends beyond the selected period (month or custom range), only the absence units that fall within the selected period are included in the export. For example, if a vacation request starts in the last week of January and continues into the first week of February, the export for January will only contain the days taken in January. The remaining days will appear in the February export.

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3. Absences per day

This sheet provides a breakdown of absences on a day-by-day basis, including the following columns:

• User ID: The user’s app-specific identifier.
• Custom ID: The custom identifier defined by your organization.
• Name: The full name of the user for whom the leave request was created.
• Email: The email address of the user associated with the leave request.

• Leave type: The type of leave that was requested.
• Date: The exact calendar date the absence falls on.
• Month: The month in which the absence occurs.
• Weekday: The day of the week corresponding to the absence date.
• Full day: Displays the timeframe of the absence for that specific day:
  • For hour-based leave types, it shows the exact number of hours and minutes.
  • For day-based leave types, it displays Full day, morning, or afternoon.
• Status: Indicates the current status of the absence on that specific day. Possible values include PENDING, APPROVED, or PUBLIC HOLIDAY. Absences that were declined or canceled are not included, as they did not result in an actual absence.
• Take from allowance: Indicates (true or false) whether the absence deducted from the user’s allowance quota.
• Workday absence duration: The deducted amount for that date, in the same unit as Allowance unit.
• Duration: The calendar span for that date. For day-based leave this is 1 or 0.5. For hour-based leave this is the elapsed minutes on that date.
• Allowance unit: The unit (days or minutes) used for the leave type linked to this absence.
• Allowance: If Take from allowance is true, the name of the associated allowance type will be shown.

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4. Adjustments

This sheet lists every manual allowance adjustment, with one row per adjustment. Use it to explain why a user’s effective allowance differs from the amount their rule grants.

• User Id, Custom Id, Name, Email: Identify the user.
• Allowance: The allowance type the adjustment belongs to.
• Date: The date the adjustment takes effect.
• Amount: The signed amount, positive to add and negative to subtract.
• Allowance unit: Days or minutes.
• Type: Either Manual for a general adjustment or Overtime for compensatory time off.
• Expiry date: The last day the adjusted days can still be used, if an expiry was set. absentify removes the days from the day after it. Only positive adjustments can expire.
• Reason: The reason entered when the adjustment was created. Corrections written during the move to allowance rules are labeled automatically, for example Balance correction from migration (2026) or Prorated first year.
• Created by: The administrator who created the adjustment. Entries from the move to allowance rules read Migration. Entries absentify wrote on its own outside a migration run, such as an overtime balance carried over, read Automatic.
• Created at: The timestamp the adjustment was recorded.

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5. Rules

This sheet documents the allowance rules configured in your workspace, with one row per rule. It is the reference for the Rule column on the Allowance sheet.

• Rule Id: The rule’s identifier, also used by the API.
• Allowance: The allowance type the rule belongs to.
• Rule name: The name shown in the settings.
• Cycle: Yearly, Monthly, Bi-weekly, or Manual.
• Amount and Allowance unit: The amount granted per cycle and its unit.
• Expiry: A summary of the carry-over and expiry configuration, for example Everything carries over · Never expires or Carry over up to 5 · Expires after 3 months.
• Max. carry forward: The cap on the amount carried into the next fiscal year, if one is set.
• Upfront allocation: Whether the full amount is available at the start of each cycle or builds up gradually.
• Payroll anchor date: The shared reference date for bi-weekly rules, if one is set.
• Active: Whether the rule is still in use.
• Members currently assigned: How many users are on this rule today. The count covers the whole workspace, even when you export a single department.
• Created at: When the rule was created.

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Calendar PDF export

The calendar PDF export creates the same printable calendar as the user calendar view. Each PDF covers the year or range you pick. It includes an Annual overview heatmap, Deductible leave and Non-deductible leave summaries, month grids, an Absence details table, and signature lines. Portrait and Landscape are different layouts, not the same pages rotated. If you select exactly one person under Employees, with no Departments selected, absentify downloads that PDF in the browser. If you select more than one person, any Departments, or a mix, absentify builds a ZIP with one PDF per active user in that selection and lists it under Recent exports.

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Step-by-step: how to export calendar PDFs

1. Access export feature Go to Settings > Export in your absentify dashboard.
2. Select format Choose Calendar PDFs (ZIP) from the Format selector.
3. Choose PDF orientation Under PDF orientation, select Portrait or Landscape.
4. Select a period Use the Year | Range toggle. Year exports a fiscal year. Range lets you pick a start and end date.
5. Choose who to export Under Export for, search and select Employees, Departments, or both. A department includes the active users in that department. Add a person under Employees to include them even if they are not in a selected department. You must pick at least one employee or department. If you do not, absentify shows Please select at least one employee or department.
6. Start export Select Create export. Exactly one person under Employees, with no Departments selected, downloads immediately, and absentify shows Your export is ready and has been downloaded. A broader selection starts a ZIP job. Download the ZIP from Recent exports once the status is Ready.

A ZIP can take a few minutes when it includes many calendars.

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What’s in each PDF?

Exactly one person under Employees, with no Departments selected, is one PDF. A broader selection is a ZIP with one PDF per active user in the selection. Every PDF includes:

• A header labeled Absence overview, with the person’s name, email, department, Employee number, Schedule, and the date range. Portrait labels the dates Range. Landscape labels them Period.
• Deductible leave: a table of Leave type, Allowance, Taken, Remaining, and Carry-forward, with the hint These leave types are deducted from your allowance. Amounts show days or hours. A note reads Carry-forward is already included in the allowance total.
• Non-deductible leave: a table of Leave type and Taken for Public holidays and leave types that do not deduct from an allowance, with the hint These leave types do not reduce your allowance.
• An Annual overview heatmap with color-coded days for absences, public holidays, and non-working days.
• A Legend that lists only the leave types and day types that appear in the selected period, such as Public holiday, Non-working day, Birthday, or Anniversary.
• Month grids for the selected period.
• An Absence details table with From, To, Leave type, Status, Approver, and Comment. Status uses a colored label for Approved, Pending, Declined, and Cancelled.
• Signature lines for Employee signature, Manager signature, and Date.

Taken is the deducted workday duration. Carry-over used by a request is already part of that figure. A summary table or the Legend appears only when there is something to show. Portrait keeps a multi-page layout. The first page has the summary tables, then the heatmap and Legend below. Later pages show four months each. The last page is the detail table. Every page uses the same header. Landscape uses three pages. The first page puts the same summary tables beside the heatmap and Legend. The second page is titled Monthly calendar and shows every month of the period on one page. The last page is the detail table. After page 1, landscape uses a short header with the person’s name, workspace, department, and period.

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Plan requirements

Downloading the calendar PDF for exactly one person under Employees, with no Departments selected, from this page, or a PDF from My calendar, requires Essentials, Plus, or Business v1. Exporting more than one calendar (more than one person, any departments, or a mix) requires Plus.

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Benefits of using the export feature

• Customizable reports: Tailor Excel by department and time range. For calendar PDFs, pick users and departments under Export for.
• Detailed insights: Gain an in-depth understanding of leave patterns, approvals, and department-specific trends.
• Audit and review ready: Maintain compliance with company policies and external audits by securely storing your absence records.
• Printable calendars: Generate professional calendar PDFs with signature lines for archiving or sharing with users and managers.