# Elements not saving? Lost 3h of work!

**URL:** <https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/elements-not-saving-lost-3h-of-work/52626>\
**Category:** Elements\
**Created:** [November 21, 2025, 11:40am UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/elements-not-saving-lost-3h-of-work/52626 "2025-11-21T11:40:05Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![SputNic](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/sputnic/32/36175_2.png) [@SputNic](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/SputNic)\
**Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 11:40am UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/elements-not-saving-lost-3h-of-work/52626/1 "2025-11-21T11:40:05Z")

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I worked on my website all morning. Made a “control-S” and quit.

15min later, opened my projet and discovered it was the one of last night!!! 🫣 No traces of another file in the “Recent” menu, in TimeMachine or anywhere else! Did it happen to anyone else?!!

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**Author:** ![differentdan](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/differentdan/32/33530_2.png) [@differentdan](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/differentdan)\
**Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 11:52am UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/elements-not-saving-lost-3h-of-work/52626/2 "2025-11-21T11:52:19Z")

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Hi @SputNic

Sorry to hear that. 😢

> [@SputNic](#):
>
> Made a “control-S” and quit.

Do you mean “ **Command + S** ”? control + S isn’t the default keyboard combo to save a project file.

 ![command-s](https://europe1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/uploads/realmacsoftware1/original/3X/2/d/2d3522b89a9d9ca159cac7f18c27a73e91152e9f.jpeg)

You might want to check if you’ve got a duplicate project file on your Mac somewhere, perhaps your most current version got saved to a different project file somewhere.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![SputNic](https://dub1.discourse-cdn.com/flex005/user_avatar/forums.realmacsoftware.com/sputnic/32/36175_2.png) [@SputNic](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/u/SputNic)\
**Post date:** [November 24, 2025, 1:14pm UTC](https://forums.realmacsoftware.com/t/elements-not-saving-lost-3h-of-work/52626/3 "2025-11-24T13:14:43Z")

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Thanks for your reply, Dan!

Yup, I meant « Command-S » 🙄

No duplicate (unless it got another name and I will never find it!)

My instinct (built on this kind of experience) would go for an “iCloud automatic sync problem” (often not nice with « packages » files (DevonThink, Scrivener…). But Elements being built to be synced with iCloud, it must be something else!

I manage to re-do my work much quicker than when I did it the first time…

Now I always check the date/time of my Element file before quitting… just in case.

Regards,

Nic