If for whatever reason copy and paste is still not working after this trick, go ahead and restart the Mac by going too the  Apple menu and choosing Restart. Sometimes that can mean Mouse Keys is enabled, or that some other app is conflicting with the standard keyboard shortcuts. If that approach works, it suggests something is going on with the keyboard rather than the clipboard. If the commands are not working, next try using the “Edit” menu approach of manually selecting Copy and Paste. Open a Mac app again where copy and paste was not working as expected, and try using the copy and paste commands again and it should work as expected.

Click on the ‘pboard’ process and then click the (X) in the Activity Monitor tool bar, then click on “Force Quit” button.

In the Search box of Activity Monitor, type “pboard”.

Open “Activity Monitor” application, it is found within the /Applications/Utilities/ folder or you can hit Command+Spacebar and type Activity Monitor to launch it via Spotlight.

Quit out of the Mac app(s) where copy/paste are not working as expected.

One way to force the Clipboard to relaunch itself in Mac OS via Activity Monitor:

How to Fix Copy & Paste Not Working, Stuck Clipboard on Mac OS

We’ll show you two different approaches to this, one using Activity Monitor and another using the command line. This resolves nearly all instances of a stuck clipboard or other issues where copy and paste stop working. These tricks work the same on all versions of macOS and Mac OS X, they work by targeting the clipboard daemon and forcing it to relaunch. Don’t stress out, most issues with nonfunctional clipboards and copy and paste on the Mac can be resolved with a series of fairly simple troubleshooting steps.

Copy and paste on macbook keyboard