Microsoft Excel copy and paste isn't working after KB5002914 update, the company confirms

Microsoft Excel users are running into a frustrating problem after the recent KB5002914 security update. While the update resolves Microsoft Excel remote code execution and information disclosure vulnerabilities, many users reported that the copy-and-paste feature fails completely. If you are among those facing the issue, you should know that Microsoft has confirmed this as a known issue in an updated documentation.

Microsoft confirms Excel security update KB5002914 leaves users with broken copy-and-paste feature

Microsoft has confirmed the issue affects Excel 2024, Excel 2021, Excel 2019, and Excel 2016. The company says the paste operation might fail silently when users attempt to insert copied content. When the bug kicks in, the source remains selected while the destination stays unchanged.

“When this issue occurs, users receive no indication of the failure, such as a beep or error message,” Microsoft confirms. In addition to the above issues, BleepingComputer reports that some users are also encountering problems with autofill and dragging formulas across cells.

As of now, there’s no official fix for Excel’s copy-and-paste issue. Microsoft has simply noted that it is “researching the issue and will post more information in this article when the information becomes available.”

Here’s how you can fix the issue until Microsoft releases an official fix

Until Microsoft releases a fix, you can try rolling back your Office installation to an earlier build. The news outlet spotted a post in the Microsoft Community Q&A section from a user, “Martin Guillou,” who mentioned removing or rolling back the update to fix the issue.

The following PowerShell command has reportedly worked for the user to restore the copy-and-paste feature, at least on Microsoft Excel 2016:

& "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\OFFICE16\Oarpmany.exe" /removereleaseinpatch "{90160000-0012-0000-1000-0000000FF1CE}" "{27882596-A8ED-4382-9C71-6CD2DD19F732}" '1036' "0"

For now, there is no permanent fix from Microsoft. Therefore, users experiencing the problem should also be careful with unofficial workarounds surfacing online.