How to see edit history in Google Sheets

How to See the Edit History of a Cell in Google Sheets

• Pranay Parab

  @prawnay

  Table of Contents Show

  • How to See the Edit History of a Cell in Google Sheets
  • Table of Contents
  • What You Can See in a Cells Edit History
  • The Limitations of Google Sheets Cell Edit History Feature
  • How to See the Edit History of a Cell in Google Sheets

Need to check who made changes to a particular cell in Google Sheets? Good news: Google Sheets does have a feature that shows you who made changes, along with a time stamp.

If youre collaborating with multiple people, it can get hard to track every change thats made to any Google Sheets document. Particularly with massive spreadsheets, going through version history can get a bit tedious if youre looking for changes made to a specific cell. Viewing a cells edit history is a much easier task.

What You Can See in a Cells Edit History

Its good to know what Google considers an edit to a cell. This will help you know what to expect when you check its edit history. There are three types of changes that show up in Google Sheets cell edit history:

• Changes to the values inside a cell, such as replacing a number with text.
• Changes to hyperlinks inside a cell.
• Changes to formulas in a cell.

Apart from this, youll also be able to see who made changes, along with a neat time stamp.

The Limitations of Google Sheets Cell Edit History Feature

This feature in Google Sheets has a few minor limitations that you should be aware of. While you can see whos edited a cell and when they did it, youll only be able to see one change at a time. Its a bit tedious to check for changes made a long time ago.

However, you can always go check the version history of your document to hone in on older changes made to the spreadsheet. Do note that some types of changes might not appear in a cells edit history, including the following:

• Changes to the cells format, such as changing a text cell to a date format in Google Sheets.
• Changes made by formulas, which means that if youve used the sum function and the result changes, youll not be able to see the change in value in the cells edit history.
• Changes related to adding or removing rows and columns.

RELATED: How to Switch to an Earlier Version of a Google Docs, Sheets, or Slides File

Another thing to remember is that this feature will only show you the edit history. You cant use this to restore older versions of data in any given cell.

How to See the Edit History of a Cell in Google Sheets

Now that we know what we can and cant see while checking a cells edit history in Google Sheets, lets check out how to use this feature. In Google Sheets, right-click any cell and select Show edit history.

If the cell is empty and no changes were made, youll see a pop-up that reads No edit history.

If edits were made to the cell, youll see a pop-up showing the name of the person who made the change, a time stamp, and details concerning the change.

Click the left arrow at the top of the pop-up to see older changes.

You can hit the right arrow at the top to see newer changes.

If your changeisnt showing up in edit history, you need to check whether its one of those changes that dont show up here. And for a more detailed log of changes made to your spreadsheet in Google Sheets, you should check its version history.

RELATED: How to See Recent Changes to Your Google Docs, Sheets, or Slides File