Numbers changes cell whilst in mid edit on iPad

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Level 1

12 points

Numbers changes cell whilst in mid edit on iPad

This confuses me … but it is hard to describe … could somebody please confirm this behaviour … and tell me what I am doing wrong this time!

The sheet simply looks to see if a product is selected, and if so adds a bullet point to the description in the final column (shaded red). These descriptions are then joined at the top of the red column to provide a bulleted list of selected products for reference elsewhere. That is the baseline starting point … and it works!

I wanted to add a line between each bullet point so I started simple …

I added (inserted) a second newline character (and even committed the change with the green tick) … this also worked as expected.

So I then added a minus sign to the formula using the on-screen keyboard key between 0 and = (the key is important!) … and committed again (also important!)

A commit of this also worked! (Bear with me … this is about to get weird)

So I went back and added a second minus sign using the same key … and bang!

I am suddenly editing in a different cell (row 2).
The contents of that cell have been replaced
They have been replaced by a single character which looks like a substitution of 2 minus signs.
Cell D4 has reverted to a point prior to the committing of the newline and the committing of the first ‘-‘

I am getting used to the editor adding commas, +, brackets etc. in the wrong place that break the formula … but I have never seen it do anything like this before!

When I tried it with the minus sign on the ‘editor’ bar (between + and x) … this does not happen. Only with the main keyboard … it moved cells and lost edits all in a single stroke!

IF this is a bug … and if it is looked at by a dev, could I ask that the ‘editor’ bar have a paste button added. It is difficult to paste into a formula if your only paste opportunity is being precise when you have to click twice in exactly the same place to launch the paste button!). We need to be able to place the caret precisely by holding the spacebar down and then press a button to paste. Thanks.

iPad Pro

Posted on Nov 10, 2025 4:29 AM

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Answer 1

Camelot

Level 9

58,245 points

Nov 11, 2025 12:20 PM in response to IHadaName

This sounds like a typical keyboard substitution.

The standard OS has keyboard substitutions setup where typing two consecutive hyphens are replaced with an em-dash character (like a hyphen, but the width of the 'm' character in the current font). It's a standard typographic standard, although more akin to text publications than spreadsheets.

So what I think is happening is that the OS is detecting a second consecutive - and replacing it with an em-dash, and the replacement action is somehow interfering with Numbers.

I can reproduce the problem on my iPad, but it doesn't occur on MacOS, so I'm inclined to class it as a bug (Please report it via Feedback - Numbers for iOS and iPadOS - Apple)

In the meantime there are two workarounds I can suggest.

One is to turn off Settings -> Keyboard -> Smart Punctuation

This will disable the automatic '--' to '–' replacement.

The other option is to not type '--' itself. Instead, type '- -' (with a space in between), THEN go back and delete the space between them. Merging two hyphens by removing the middle space does not trigger the em-dash replacement and you should be good to go.

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Answer 2

Badunit

Level 7

30,318 points

Nov 10, 2025 8:03 AM in response to IHadaName

Wish I could help but I guess my version of iOS Numbers is too old (on my phone). I can't get it to put a newline character into the formula nor can I copy/paste one from a cell.

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