Pasting a chart from Excel 2013 into PowerPoint 2007 or 2013

Hi Karen,

I've seen this a few times before. Sometimes re-making the chart in Excel and pasting it fixes the #Ref.

Options to explore - how it is being pasted

There are two ways of copying a live chart
When you right click you get a choice of Paste Special, you will see these options if you hover over the icons

Linking
Leaves the Chart in Excel and links all of the data points to the Excel data. Likely to get the #REF error.
If you have a password on the Excel file/protection then this can cause a #REF error.

Embedding
Copies the Excel file and brings it into PowerPoint and draws the chart from that one.
This is an internal link. Less likely to get a #REF.

When you click on the Chart - look for the Green tab along the top, Chart Design and click on Update. Try doing this with the Excel file open, if that fixes it, then it's a security/file location issue.

Please send me a further message if trying that doesn't fix the problem.

Kind regards

Richard Bailey
Microsoft Certified Trainer

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