Fix for Google Sheets error message: “Can’t save your changes. Copy any recent changes, then revert to an earlier revision”


If you come across a message that Google Sheets can’t save your sheets and you need to revert to an earlier version, but even the earlier version can’t save, don’t bother doing any of these suggested steps. Clearing cookies won’t help. Disabling extensions won’t help.

Instead, try this (as counterintuitive as it seems): copy and paste your Google Sheets cells into a new Excel workbook. Save the Excel workbook and upload it to Google Drive. Open it with Google Sheets. Save that sheet. Delete your old, non-working sheet.


11 responses to “Fix for Google Sheets error message: “Can’t save your changes. Copy any recent changes, then revert to an earlier revision””

    • Well, this is a workaround, not a fix, so you may have to put a little more work into the workaround. Copy and paste the text from your Google Sheet and then, after you upload your Excel workbook to Google Drive, try to manually re-insert the images again.

    • I mean, I’m not Google, so I can’t tell you for sure what’s retrievable and what’s not. Probably the best thing to do would be to look through the version history: File > Version history > See version history.

      Good luck!

  1. Google meant that, create a New Worksheet (not whole workbook) and format as it was, and rename it as it was, and delete the older currupt one. It worked for me!!

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