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Every 15 minutes

Import contacts from a CSV in Google Drive into Notion

Drop a contacts CSV into your Drive folder and each contact is added to your Notion database, with duplicates skipped.

Runs
Every 15 minutes
Apps
Google Drive, Notion
AI
Not needed
Access
drive.readonly; Notion read+insert

Send this to your assistant

Create a ClickRuntime automation: when a CSV lands in my Drive 'Imports' folder, add each contact to my Notion Contacts database, skipping anyone whose email is already there.

Paste it into your assistant. It tells you what it will send or change before it runs live.

First time? Adding ClickRuntime to your assistant takes about two minutes.

Why use it

Why teams use this automation

A small team keeps its contacts in a Notion database, but new contacts arrive as spreadsheets: an event attendee list, an export from a webinar tool, a list from a partner. Notion's own import creates a new database rather than adding to the existing one, so people end up copying rows by hand and creating duplicates.

Dropping the file into a Drive folder and having each contact added to the right database, checked against existing emails, turns a fiddly afternoon task into a file upload.

What you get out of it

  • No duplicate contacts

    Each email is checked against your database before a contact is added. People already in Notion are skipped, so your list stays clean.

  • Adds to the database you already use

    Contacts land in your existing Contacts database with its views, relations and filters. You do not end up with a pile of separate imported tables.

  • Anyone can import

    Uploading a file to a Drive folder needs no Notion know-how. A colleague can bring in an event list without help.

  • Every import is processed once

    Each file is remembered after it is imported. Leaving it in the folder does not create the contacts again.

How it works

What happens, step by step

  1. Every 15 minutes, ClickRuntime checks your Imports folder in Google Drive for CSV files it has not processed.

  2. If there are none, it stops there until the next check.

  3. It reads each new file and looks up which email addresses are already in your Notion Contacts database.

  4. Each new contact is added as a page in the database, duplicates are skipped, and the file is remembered so it is not imported again.

Before it runs live

  • Connect Google Drive
  • Connect Notion and share the database you want it to use

What you get

RunsEvery 15 minutes
Import contacts from a CSV in Google Drive into Notiontoday, 9:00Succeeded
Notion · ContactsImported Contoso-expo-attendees.csv: 148 contacts added, 23 already in your database skipped.

Build your own

Need it to work differently?

This template is a starting point. Copy the prompt and change it, or describe a different automation from scratch, with your own conditions, more apps or an AI step. Your assistant writes it, tests it and runs it on ClickRuntime.
  • Your own rules

    Conditions, thresholds, filters and exceptions, written the way you'd explain them to a colleague.

  • Any number of apps

    One automation can read from one app and update several others. Over 248 apps are ready, and anything with an API works too.

  • AI where it helps

    Summaries, classification, extraction and drafts use ClickRuntime's built-in AI, with no extra key.

  • On a schedule or on each event

    Runs as often as every 5 minutes, or the moment an app sends an event, and keeps track of what it already handled.

Changes you can ask for

  • Act only on the items that match your own rules, and skip the rest
  • Add an AI step, for example to summarize, sort or draft a reply
  • Add another app, for example also send it to Slack
  • Combine it with other Google Drive and Notion steps into one automation

Under the hood

The code that runs this automation

This is the Python script that runs each time the automation starts. Your AI assistant writes it for you when you send the prompt, and you allow each step in your assistant. To change how the automation works, describe the change to your assistant and it updates the script for you. For every function it can use, see the script reference.
import_csv_contacts_from_drive_into_notion.pyexample
import csv, io, time
from google.oauth2.credentials import Credentials
from googleapiclient.discovery import build
from clickruntime import on_trigger, credentials, http, state, report_fetched

FOLDER_ID, DB = "your-folder-id", "your-database-id"

@on_trigger
def run(event):
    drive = build("drive", "v3", credentials=Credentials(credentials.connection("google", "work")), cache_discovery=False)
    done = set(state.get("done") or [])
    files = [f for f in drive.files().list(q=f"'{FOLDER_ID}' in parents and mimeType='text/csv' and trashed=false").execute().get("files", []) if f["id"] not in done]
    report_fetched(len(files))
    if not files:
        return {"summary": "Nothing new"}
    nh = {"Authorization": f"Bearer {credentials.connection('notion', 'work')}", "Notion-Version": "2022-06-28"}
    added = 0
    for f in files:
        for row in csv.DictReader(io.StringIO(drive.files().get_media(fileId=f["id"]).execute().decode("utf-8-sig"))):
            email = (row.get("email") or row.get("Email") or "").strip().lower()
            if not email:
                continue
            q = {"filter": {"property": "Email", "email": {"equals": email}}}
            if http.post(f"https://api.notion.com/v1/databases/{DB}/query", headers=nh, json=q).json()["results"]:
                continue
            http.post("https://api.notion.com/v1/pages", headers=nh, json={"parent": {"database_id": DB}, "properties": {
                "Name": {"title": [{"text": {"content": row.get("name") or email}}]}, "Email": {"email": email}}})
            added += 1
            time.sleep(0.35)
        done.add(f["id"])
    state.set("done", list(done))
    return {"files": len(files), "added": added}

FAQ

Common questions

Which columns does the CSV need?
An email column at minimum, plus any of name, company and phone. Column names are matched to your Notion properties, and extra columns are ignored.
What happens to a contact who is already in Notion?
They are skipped, based on their email address. The import can be changed to fill in missing fields on the existing contact instead.
How large can the file be?
A few thousand rows works well. Notion accepts only a few new pages per second, so very large files take a while and may be split across more than one check.
What permissions does it need?
drive.readonly; Notion read+insert. Nothing else in your accounts is used.
Does it need AI?
No. It runs without AI, so it doesn't use your plan's AI allowance.
How many runs does it use?
One run each time it checks. Checks that find nothing new and stop right away aren't counted.
Can I change how it works?
Yes. Describe the change to your AI assistant, for example a different schedule, channel or filter. It updates the automation, tests it and tells you what changed.

Set up “Import contacts from a CSV in Google Drive into Notion” from your assistant

Copy the prompt above, or connect your assistant first. Free plan, no credit card.