It’s no secret that Google Docs (and Sheets and Slides) retains your version (edit) history. But a long list of dates and times you made updates to the document isn’t all that useful without any other detail or references.
You can actually NAME your document versions.
Without named versions, when you go to File > Version history > See version history – you will see a pop-out sidebar with a current Doc’s history.
Shared a Doc with a colleague? Name the moment in time that you shared it.
Uplevel your use of the Version history feature by going to File > Version history > Name current version.
Enter the name of the version you want “saved” and then your searches through past changes will have more meaning.
You can also name previous versions by clicking More actions on a version > More > Name this version.
There are lots of smart ways to use this but an ideal one is to create a named version when you give editing access, for example!
Name versions could be: Draft v1, or Review v1, Print v1, Final. Add names of collaborators to different versions for extra detail.
p.s. (Hack #12) This blog post is part of a series called Top 40 Google Hacks You’ll Wish You’d Been Using All Along. Download the whole handy Top 40 Google Hacks PDF.
