diff --git a/public/app/features/inspector/utils/download.test.ts b/public/app/features/inspector/utils/download.test.ts
index 7294ded12fe..6735731dabb 100644
--- a/public/app/features/inspector/utils/download.test.ts
+++ b/public/app/features/inspector/utils/download.test.ts
@@ -38,10 +38,25 @@ describe('inspector download', () => {
         const filename = call[1];
         const text = await blob.text();
 
+        // By default the BOM character should not be included
+        expect(await hasBOM(blob)).toBe(false);
         expect(text).toEqual(expected);
         expect(filename).toEqual(`${title}-data-${dateTimeFormat(1400000000000)}.csv`);
       }
     );
+
+    it('should include the BOM character when useExcelHeader is true', async () => {
+      downloadDataFrameAsCsv(dataFrameFromJSON(json), 'test', { useExcelHeader: true });
+
+      const call = (saveAs as unknown as jest.Mock).mock.calls[0];
+      const blob = call[0];
+      const filename = call[1];
+      const text = await blob.text();
+
+      expect(await hasBOM(blob)).toBe(true);
+      expect(text).toEqual('sep=,\r\n"time","name","value"\r\n100,a,1');
+      expect(filename).toEqual(`test-data-${dateTimeFormat(1400000000000)}.csv`);
+    });
   });
 
   describe('downloadAsJson', () => {
@@ -104,3 +119,19 @@ describe('inspector download', () => {
     });
   });
 });
+
+async function hasBOM(blob: Blob) {
+  const reader = new FileReader();
+  return new Promise<boolean>((resolve, reject) => {
+    reader.onload = (event: ProgressEvent<FileReader>) => {
+      if (event.target?.result instanceof ArrayBuffer) {
+        const arr = new Uint8Array(event.target.result);
+        resolve(arr[0] === 0xef && arr[1] === 0xbb && arr[2] === 0xbf); // Check for UTF-8 BOM
+      } else {
+        reject(new Error('Unexpected FileReader result type'));
+      }
+    };
+    reader.onerror = reject;
+    reader.readAsArrayBuffer(blob.slice(0, 3)); // Read only the first 3 bytes
+  });
+}
diff --git a/public/app/features/inspector/utils/download.ts b/public/app/features/inspector/utils/download.ts
index 47c52a47f3a..2a7c203677b 100644
--- a/public/app/features/inspector/utils/download.ts
+++ b/public/app/features/inspector/utils/download.ts
@@ -57,8 +57,9 @@ export function downloadDataFrameAsCsv(
   transformId: DataTransformerID = DataTransformerID.noop
 ) {
   const dataFrameCsv = toCSV([dataFrame], csvConfig);
+  const bomChar = csvConfig?.useExcelHeader ? String.fromCharCode(0xfeff) : '';
 
-  const blob = new Blob([String.fromCharCode(0xfeff), dataFrameCsv], {
+  const blob = new Blob([bomChar, dataFrameCsv], {
     type: 'text/csv;charset=utf-8',
   });