To extract data from financial statements, you can use an AI extraction tool like Lido. Lido reads balance sheets, income statements, and cash flow statements in any format and turns line items, balances, and totals into clean spreadsheet data you can export to Excel.
In this tutorial, we will walk you through how to extract data from financial statements using Lido. Simply follow the steps below.
Before you start, make sure you have your financial statements saved as PDFs, images, or scanned copies.
If you don't have a Lido account yet, you can create one for free here.
Once you're logged in, create a New File.
Click on Tools in the top menu and select the PDF Table Extractor. This tool is designed to read tables and structured data from your financial statements.
Drag and drop your file into Lido, or click to upload. Native PDFs, scanned copies, and photos of paper statements all work, including multi-page files.
For the purpose of this tutorial, we are using a sample set of financial statements. Each statement, such as the income statement or balance sheet, usually sits on its own page.
Click the page you need in the left panel, then drag the selection box over the table you want to pull. Make sure to include every period column, such as 2025 and 2024. If the same layout repeats on every page, check Apply selection to all pages.
Once you have your selection, click Extract Data.
Review the extracted data to make sure it includes everything you need. You can go back to adjust your selection. When you're satisfied, click Insert at Active Cell to add it to your spreadsheet.
You can edit and format the cells however you need. Format amounts as currency, adjust column widths, or reorganize the data to match your workpapers or models.
A quick tie-out, such as checking that total assets equal total liabilities plus equity, confirms the data is ready to use.
Once you're done, click Export to Excel at the top to download your financial statement data as a spreadsheet file.
Lido can extract any line item from the three main financial statements, plus the notes and schedules that support them:
Balance sheet: Every asset, liability, and equity line item with its balance for each period shown.
Income statement: Revenue, cost of goods sold, operating expenses, and every subtotal down to net income.
Cash flow statement: Operating, investing, and financing activities, plus the net change in cash.
Notes and schedules: Debt maturity schedules, lease payment tables, segment breakdowns, and related-party details.
Comparative periods: Current-year and prior-year balances in separate columns, so you can calculate changes right away.
Many teams still use one of these methods. Here's where each one falls short:
Manual copy and paste: Copying from a PDF into Excel often puts numbers in the wrong columns, drops the parentheses on negative values, and splits account names across cells. At 10 to 15 minutes per statement, an audit with 15 subsidiaries means hours of data entry before any real work starts.
Template-based tools: These extract data from fixed areas of a page, which works when a statement's layout never changes. But templates break when a client switches accounting systems, adopts a new chart of accounts, or changes its format. For audit teams working with many different clients, maintaining templates can create almost as much work as it saves.
Lido avoids both problems because it reads each statement the way a person would. It recognizes subtotals, period columns, and negative values in any layout, with no templates to build or update. Layout handling is worth testing first when you compare financial statement extraction tools.
Financial statement extraction saves the most time for teams that handle statements in many different formats:
Audit teams: A single mid-size audit can involve 20 to 30 financial documents, including current and prior-year statements, interim statements, and subsidiary financials. Automating extraction frees staff for risk assessment and testing. Auditors who also review cash activity can pair this with tools that analyze bank statements.
FP&A teams and controllers: Consolidating results from subsidiaries on different accounting systems can take two to three days each month by hand. Automated extraction cuts that to hours.
Investment analysts and private equity teams: Analysts pull data from 10-K filings and portfolio company reports to feed valuation models, comparable company analyses, and performance dashboards.
For more tools built for this work, see our guide to the best OCR software for accounting firms.
Now that you know how to extract data from financial statements, you can spend less time on data entry and more time on analysis.
Lido is the best tool for extracting data from financial statements because it handles any format without templates. It identifies line items, balances, periods, and subtotals automatically, works on native PDFs, scans, and photos, and exports straight to Excel.
Yes. Lido combines OCR, which reads text from images, with AI that understands the statement's layout. It extracts accounts, balances, and columns from scanned and photographed statements without any extra preparation.
For native PDFs exported from accounting systems, AI extraction typically achieves over 99% accuracy on individual values, and clear scans reach similar levels. Standard tie-outs, like checking that total assets equal total liabilities plus equity, confirm the data is ready to use.
Include every period column in your selection when you use the PDF Table Extractor. Lido keeps each period in its own column, so you can calculate year-over-year changes right away.
Yes. Lido extracts tables from notes and schedules, such as debt maturity schedules, lease payment tables, and segment breakdowns, even when they are mixed with narrative text.
%20(1).svg)
.png){kind=small}
