Mail merge certificates from Excel: Word vs a bulk tool
If you have a list of names in Excel and a certificate design, there are two common ways to turn them into one certificate per person: Microsoft Word's mail merge, or a tool built for certificates. Both work. Here's how each one goes with the same class list, and where each one falls down.
The example
A community college in Portmore runs a 10-week evening course in bookkeeping. 38 learners finished it. The coordinator has an Excel sheet like this:
| Name | Course | Date | Hours |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shantel Bailey | Bookkeeping for Small Business | 15/10/2026 | 30 |
| Rohan McKenzie | Bookkeeping for Small Business | 15/10/2026 | 30 |
| Natalia Muñoz | Bookkeeping for Small Business | 15/10/2026 | 27.5 |
| …35 more rows | |||
The goal: 38 certificates, each emailed to its learner as a PDF.
Option 1: Word mail merge
These steps are for Word in Microsoft 365 on Windows. Word for Mac has the same Mailings tab with small differences.
- Design the certificate in Word, or start from one of Word's certificate templates. Leave the name, date and hours as gaps.
- Go to Mailings › Start Mail Merge › Letters.
- Select Recipients › Use an Existing List, choose the Excel file and the sheet. Tick “First row of data contains column headers”.
- Click where the name goes and use Insert Merge Field › Name. Do the same for Course, Date and Hours.
- Click Preview Results and step through a few records.
- Finish & Merge › Edit Individual Documents › All. Word creates one new document with 38 pages, one certificate per page.
The first preview usually turns up two problems:
- Dates. Word often shows Excel dates in US order (10/15/2026) whatever your sheet shows. To fix it, press Alt+F9 to show field codes and change the field to
{ MERGEFIELD Date \@ "d MMMM yyyy" }, then press Alt+F9 again. It now reads “15 October 2026”. - Decimals. 27.5 hours can come through as 27.4999999. Add a number switch:
{ MERGEFIELD Hours \# "0.#" }.
Then comes the real chore. You now have one 38-page document, but each learner needs their own file. Word has no built-in way to save each merged record as a separate PDF. The usual choices are:
- save the whole document as one PDF and split it with a PDF tool, then rename 38 files by hand;
- run a VBA macro that saves each section as its own PDF named from the Name field (plenty are shared online; check what you paste);
- install a paid mail-merge add-in that does it for you.
For a QR code per certificate, Word has a MERGEBARCODE field that can make QR codes from a column. You'd need an ID column in Excel, and somewhere to host a page for each ID if the codes should link to anything.
Option 2: a bulk certificate tool
The same job in CertSheet:
- Open the app and upload the .xlsx file as it is (the first sheet is used).
- Pick a template, or upload the college's own design as a PNG, JPG or PDF background with the gaps left empty.
- CertSheet recognises the Name, Course and Date columns. Change the title line to “completed {Hours} hours of {Course}”. Because the dates are real Excel dates, they come out as “15 October 2026”, or in another format you pick. (In a CSV, a date is printed exactly as typed unless it's written as 2026-10-15.)
- Drag the fields into place on the preview and step through a few learners, checking long names like “Natalia Muñoz”.
- Tick the confirmation and generate. You get a ZIP with
Shantel Bailey.pdf,Rohan McKenzie.pdf… one per row, plus an optional combined PDF for printing. Each certificate has a unique ID and QR code.
Generation runs in your browser and takes a fraction of a second per certificate, and the spreadsheet isn't uploaded anywhere. 38 certificates is over the free limit of 20 per batch, so the coordinator would either run two batches or use Pro or an Event Pass, which also removes the small footer and adds online verification pages.
Honest pros and cons
| Word mail merge | Bulk certificate tool (CertSheet) | |
|---|---|---|
| Cost | Free if you already have Microsoft 365 | Free up to 20 per batch with a footer; US$12/month, US$99/year or US$19 for a 7-day pass beyond that |
| Design freedom | Anything Word can lay out: tables, logos, several signatures, any wording | Fixed set of fields (heading, intro, name, title, date, 3 custom fields) on a template or your own background |
| One PDF per person | Not built in: split by hand, use a macro or buy an add-in | Built in, named after each person |
| Dates and numbers | Need field switches to format properly | Excel dates formatted from a menu; other values printed as they are in the sheet |
| QR codes and verification | Possible with MERGEBARCODE, but you host any verification pages yourself | Unique ID and QR on every certificate; hosted verification pages on paid plans |
| Learning curve | Familiar if you know Word; field codes are fiddly | One page, but it's a new tool to learn |
| Works offline | Yes | Needs the web page to load; then generation happens on your device |
| Your data | Stays on your computer | Stays in your browser unless you publish a batch for verification |
Which to choose
- Choose Word if you're making a handful of certificates, print them rather than email them, need a complex layout, or already have a macro that splits the PDFs.
- Choose a bulk tool if you email certificates individually, run courses or events regularly, want QR verification, or have more than about 20 people at a time. The time saved is mostly in the splitting and renaming.
You can also combine them: design the certificate in Word, export it as PDF with the gaps left empty, and use that file as your CertSheet background.
Next: how to lay out your spreadsheet and wording for completion certificates.