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Hi Reader,

Welcome to the Google Sheets Tips newsletter #357, your Monday morning espresso, in spreadsheet form!

Coming to your inbox on a Tuesday because it was a public holiday here in the US yesterday (Happy Labor Day!).

I had a friend and his family visit (Mr Data School himself!). We had a great weekend exploring in the woods, watching the kids catch crayfish, and making s'mores over a fire in the evening. I feel recharged (and a little tired) and ready to dive into work this week.

Today's topic is one you might never use, but one that you'll be eternally grateful for if you do.

We're talking about version history and how it can save your bacon if you make a mistake in your Sheets.

➜ News

I.
​Last week, Google announced that Gemini is now making the Tables feature even better, with auto-generated Table names.

​Read more here >>​

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➜ Sheets Tip #357: Time Travel in Google Sheets

Have you ever had that heart-stopping moment where you accidentally deleted a crucial column, overwrote a complex formula, or just generally messed up a perfectly good spreadsheet?

Don't panic, there are three easy ways to recover that data, or formula, or perfectly good spreadsheet:

1. Use the Undo option

For recent mistakes that you notice right away (e.g. the "oops, I didn't mean to delete that column" type) you can use the Undo option to go back a step. Press again to go back another step.

To use Undo, either:

• Use the shortcut Cmd + Z (on Mac) or Ctrl + Z (PC/Chromebook)
• Select via the menu: Edit > Undo
• Press the Undo button in the toolbar

2. Access older versions with Version History

But what if the mistake was made last week?

Or what if you only notice an error after you or a collaborator has made other changes?

For those situations, you need a more powerful tool.

It’s called Version History, and it's a complete, browsable time machine for your spreadsheet.

You can access it in two ways:

1. Go to the menu File > Version history > See version history
2. The Shortcut: Press Ctrl + Alt + Shift + H (or Cmd + Option + Shift + H on a Mac)

In Version History, you see a timeline of all the automatically saved versions, grouped by date and time:

For important project milestones, you can name a version for easy reference later.

To name a version, either:

1. From your normal Sheet view, go to the menu File > Version history > Name current version
2. If you're already in Version History, click the three dots (⋮) next to a version, and select "Name this version."

Each collaborator is assigned a unique color, so you can see at a glance who made which changes.

When you click on a past version in the timeline, the main window updates to show you a preview of exactly what the Sheet looked like at that moment, with all the changes highlighted.

If you need to revert the entire document to a previous state, just select the version you want from the timeline and click the big blue "Restore this version" button at the top.

3. Use cell edit history for a "Surgical" Fix (the Pro-Tip ✨)

Sometimes you don't want to restore an entire sheet; you just need to fix a single, critical cell.

Right-click on any cell and select "Show edit history."

A small window will pop up showing a chronological log of every change made to that specific cell, including who made the change and when:

Copy the previous data or formula that you want and paste back into the cell.

Bingo! You're back in business.

If you enjoyed this newsletter, please forward it to a friend who might enjoy it.

Have a great week!

Cheers,
Ben

P.S. Nothing makes you feel old like watching professional sports ;)​