Copy Paste Not Working on Mac? 10 Fixes, Fastest First

Short answer: Restart the clipboard. Open Terminal and run killall pboard, or quit pboard in Activity Monitor. macOS relaunches it instantly and copy and paste usually work again. If not, test in TextEdit to rule out one app, quit any clipboard manager or key remapper, check App Shortcuts for ⌘C or ⌘V, and check Handoff for Universal Clipboard.

TL;DR

• First fix: killall pboard restarts the macOS clipboard. You lose only the current copy.
• Test in TextEdit. If it works there, the problem is the other app or website, not your Mac.
• Clipboard managers and remappers can swallow ⌘C and ⌘V. Quit them one at a time to test.
• Universal Clipboard can replace your copy with one from your iPhone. Handoff settings control it.
• Still broken: log out and back in, then restart. Both restart every process in your session.

Why did copy and paste stop working on my Mac?

The clipboard on a Mac is run by a background process called pboard, the pasteboard server. Every app hands its copies to pboard and asks pboard for them when you paste. When pboard stalls, copy and paste break everywhere at once, which is the most common version of this problem.

When it breaks in only one place, the cause is usually local: an app that blocks copying, a website that intercepts it, or a tool that grabs the shortcut first.

Symptom	Likely cause	Fix
Nothing copies or pastes in any app	pboard stalled	Fix 1: killall pboard
Works in TextEdit, fails in one app or site	That app or page	Fix 3
⌘C and ⌘V do nothing, Edit menu works	Shortcut remapped or intercepted	Fixes 4 and 5
You paste something you didn’t copy	Universal Clipboard	Fix 6
A clipboard manager’s hotkey stopped working	Secure input or permissions	Fixes 7 and 8
Paste fails in a VM or remote desktop	Clipboard sharing off	Fix 9

Fix 1: How do I restart the clipboard on a Mac?

This fixes most cases. It restarts pboard, and macOS starts it again on its own.

In Terminal:

1. Open Terminal (Applications › Utilities, or ⌘Space and type “Terminal”).
2. Run:

killall pboard

3. Copy something and paste it to test.

You don’t need sudo, because pboard runs in your own session. Whatever was on the clipboard is lost, so copy it again.

In Activity Monitor (no Terminal needed):

1. Open Activity Monitor (Applications › Utilities).
2. Type pboard in the search field at the top right.
3. Select pboard and click the Stop button in the toolbar.
4. Click Quit. If it doesn’t go, repeat and choose Force Quit.

If you’ve seen the message “Sorry, no manipulations with clipboard allowed,” this is the fix to try first.

Fix 2: Is the clipboard actually empty, or is paste failing?

Find out which half is broken. These Terminal commands are read-only:

pbpaste

pbpaste prints the text on the clipboard. If you copied text and pbpaste prints it, copying works and the problem is pasting into a specific app. If it prints nothing, the copy never landed.

To test the write side, this one replaces your clipboard with the word “test”:

echo test | pbcopy

Then press ⌘V in TextEdit. If “test” appears, the clipboard itself is fine.

You can also check without Terminal: in Finder, choose Edit › Show Clipboard to see the current item.

Fix 3: Is it just one app or website?

Open TextEdit, type a word, copy it and paste it. If that works, your Mac’s clipboard is fine and the problem is the app you were using.

Common app-level causes:

• Websites that block copying. Some pages disable text selection or intercept the copy event. Try selecting with the mouse and using Edit › Copy from the menu bar, or open the page in Reader view in Safari (the Reader button in the address bar) and copy from there.
• Password and banking fields often refuse paste on purpose.
• Apps that are frozen won’t respond to the Edit menu either. Quit and reopen the app.
• Protected documents. A PDF with copy restrictions can block selection.
• Remote and web apps (a Citrix session, a browser-based IDE) may ask the browser for clipboard permission. Check the site’s permission prompt or settings.

Fix 4: Has something taken over ⌘C or ⌘V?

If Edit › Copy and Edit › Paste work from the menu but the shortcuts don’t, a shortcut has been reassigned.

1. Open System Settings › Keyboard.
2. Click Keyboard Shortcuts….
3. Select App Shortcuts. Remove any entry that uses ⌘C, ⌘V or ⌘X unless you added it on purpose. (A common deliberate one remaps ⌘V to Paste and Match Style; see paste without formatting on Mac.)
4. Select Modifier Keys and make sure Command is mapped to ⌘ Command for your keyboard. Use the Select keyboard menu if you have more than one.
5. Click Done.

Also check any key remapping tool you’ve installed, such as Karabiner-Elements or a keyboard vendor’s utility. Quit it and test again.

Fix 5: Is a clipboard manager getting in the way?

Clipboard managers sit between you and the clipboard, which is why they’re useful and why they can be the problem.

1. Quit each clipboard manager, launcher or text expander from its menu bar icon.
2. Test copy and paste in TextEdit.
3. Reopen them one at a time until the problem returns.

Two things to check in the culprit’s settings:

• Paste needs Accessibility. Apps that paste for you send ⌘V on your behalf, and macOS requires the Accessibility permission for that. Check System Settings › Privacy & Security › Accessibility and make sure the app is listed and switched on. After a macOS update, toggling it off and on again sometimes helps; macOS permissions after an update explains why.
• Paste from Other Apps. Newer macOS versions can ask before an app reads what you copied in another app. If a clipboard manager stops recording, look for it in System Settings › Privacy & Security › Paste from Other Apps and set it to Allow.

We make FavTray, so weigh our take accordingly. FavTray Clipboard is designed around both of these: it reads the clipboard only when macOS allows it without asking, so a copy never raises an alert in the background, and a two-step guide gets it into Paste from Other Apps if macOS is asking. Without the Accessibility permission, its quick paste copies instead and you press ⌘V. It also has Pause (15 minutes, an hour, or until tomorrow), which is a quick way to rule it out without quitting.

Fix 6: Is Universal Clipboard replacing what you copied?

Universal Clipboard shares your latest copy between your own Apple devices. When it works, you copy on your iPhone and paste on your Mac. When it misfires, you paste something you never copied on the Mac, or a paste pauses while it fetches from another device.

If you want it to work, both devices need:

• Wi-Fi and Bluetooth turned on.
• Handoff turned on.
• The same Apple Account.
• To be near each other (Apple says within 30 feet, about 10 meters, in its copy and paste between devices guide).

Copied content is available only for a short time, so paste soon after copying.

Turn Handoff on or off on the Mac (per Apple’s Handoff guide):

1. Open System Settings › General.
2. Click AirDrop & Continuity (called AirDrop & Handoff on some versions).
3. Switch Allow Handoff between this Mac and your iCloud devices on or off.

On iPhone or iPad: Settings › General › AirPlay & Continuity (or AirPlay & Handoff), then Handoff.

If Universal Clipboard stopped working after it used to work, turn Handoff off and on again on both devices, and toggle Bluetooth once.

Fix 7: Why did my clipboard manager’s shortcut stop working?

This is often Secure Input. When a password field is focused, or an app turns on secure keyboard entry (Terminal has it in its menu: Terminal › Secure Keyboard Entry), macOS stops other apps from seeing keystrokes. Global hotkeys for clipboard managers and text expanders stop firing until it’s released. ⌘C and ⌘V in the front app still work.

To see which app has Secure Input on, run this read-only command:

ioreg -l -w 0 | grep -i SecureInput

If it prints a line with kCGSSessionSecureInputPID, the number after it is the process ID. Find it in Activity Monitor (the PID column) and quit that app, or click out of its password field. If you turned on Secure Keyboard Entry in Terminal on purpose, turn it off while you need the hotkey.

Fix 8: Copying files in Finder doesn’t work

In Finder, ⌘C then ⌘V copies files. ⌥⌘V moves them (Apple lists it as “Move the files in the Clipboard from their original location to the current location” in its keyboard shortcuts). If paste is greyed out:

• You may be in a folder you can’t write to. Check with File › Get Info › Sharing & Permissions.
• The source may be on a disconnected drive or network share.
• Relaunch Finder: hold ⌥, right-click the Finder icon in the Dock and choose Relaunch.

Fix 9: Copy and paste fails in a VM or remote desktop

Virtual machines and remote desktop apps sync their clipboard with your Mac through their own setting, which is often off by default or reset after an update. Look for “shared clipboard” or “clipboard sync” in the VM or remote app’s settings, and restart the guest tools if the VM has them. killall pboard on the Mac side can help when the sync gets stuck.

Fix 10: Log out, then restart

If nothing above helps:

1. Log out and back in (Apple menu › Log Out). This restarts every process in your session, including pboard and anything hooked into it.
2. Restart the Mac.
3. If it still fails, create a test user (System Settings › Users & Groups › Add User) and try copy and paste there. If it works in the new user, something in your account (a login item, a remapper, a manager) is the cause. Remove login items in System Settings › General › Login Items & Extensions one at a time.

How do I stop it happening again?

• Keep one clipboard manager. Two apps watching the clipboard is a common source of odd behaviour.
• Know your remaps. If you add App Shortcuts or a remapper, write down what you changed.
• Turn off Handoff if Universal Clipboard surprises you more than it helps.
• Bookmark the fix. killall pboard takes two seconds.

If you lost something you copied earlier, check Spotlight’s clipboard history on macOS Tahoe 26 or later (⌘Space, then ⌘4). Our clipboard history on Mac guide covers it, and the best clipboard managers for Mac list covers apps that keep longer history.

FavTray Clipboard is free with 24 hours of history, 5 pins and 10 pastes into apps a day. Lifetime is $4.99 once for 1 Mac, with a 7-day full trial, no card and no sign-up. See pricing.