Copying (⌘ + C) and pasting (⌘ + V) have always been the most basic functions of the Mac. We use them hundreds of times a day and have become an integral part of our working lives. When they don’t work, it can cause a lot of trouble for your work.
Why the Mac Clipboard Doesn’t Work Everything we copy on the Mac is stored in a buffer space called the clipboard and can contain any type of information, from text fragments to files to images.
Technically, the clipboard is a piece of software that is as much a part of macOS as any other piece of software. This is why it is susceptible to errors and breakdowns. Unlike other software, however, the clipboard does not have a user interface, so you cannot interact with it, exit it, or restart it in a normal way.
How to Fix Copy and Paste in macOS The way to fix an unusable clipboard in macOS is essentially to find that particular process and restart it. You can do this in two ways: using a terminal or an activity monitor.
Terminal is the fastest and most accurate way to handle copy-paste not working:
Open a terminal
Enter killall pboard and press Enter
The pboard process is the process that runs the clipboard on the Mac. This command forces it to shut down. But since you can’t run a Mac without the clipboard, the Pboard will reboot automatically and hopefully work fine.
There is another way to restart pboard using activity monitor:
Start active monitor
Use search at the top to find the Pboard procedure
Select pBoard and click the stop icon in the top bar
Forcible Exit
Okay, you can fix copy and paste that isn’t working by following these simple steps.