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I'd like to know when a document has been created, but Google Docs doesn't seem to display that information anywhere. I tried looking at the revisions, but all it displays is a relative time (2 months ago).

If there was a way to find the date of any revision, that would be even better.

Any help?

6 Answers 6

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Google recently updated the document revisions and they are displaying the exact date for each of them. For older documents it doesn't seem to be working, but at least all your new documents will be the way you wanted it.

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Just open Your Google Doc and open the File menu and choose "Document Details". One of the items listed is "Created" date.

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  • 1
    Funny, the most correct answer is given negative 2 votes. +1
    – Pacerier
    Dec 22, 2017 at 8:57
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    Revision history is often disabled in corporate Google Apps-based Google Drives, for example. In that (and my) case, this is the only answer that works.
    – ijoseph
    Jan 11, 2019 at 2:17
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If you open the document, you can view the revision history from the File menu. The oldest entry will be the original version, when you created it.

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  • That's what GoodEngough said that is not good enough to see it in relative time.. :)
    – Lipis
    Jul 23, 2010 at 7:20
  • In my revision list (twitpic.com/27sypz), the actual date is shown next to each revision. Maybe GoodEnough was looking at a different version history than the one shown from the File menu of the document in question? Jul 23, 2010 at 8:41
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    @Bernard No that's exactly the revision list I was looking at and it's in relative time. I just checked and the revision history is different depending on the type of document. My problem was with text documents which only shows relative time, for spreadsheets it's possible to see the date. Thanks for trying to help :)
    – mbillard
    Jul 23, 2010 at 11:55
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Depending on the sharing status of the document, the Share/Publication date on the "Publish to the Web" menu under file can show an early date on the document. Revision history only goes back about a year.

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  • Where do you see a Share/Publication date?
    – endolith
    Sep 30, 2012 at 0:28
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This is what can be found on Googles Help page regarding this topic:

No - the best you can do is go File-Revision history and go back through the revisions - but note eventually Gdocs collapses or deletes early revisions, at least in spreadsheets, so this may not take you right back to the start.

If it is important to know when a file was created (although of course that original file will no longer exist as such since it has been modified) I suggest you put a note right at the bottom manually - maybe as a footnote - which states this.

http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Google+Docs/thread?tid=3a2ef6654058bbfd&hl=en

So it seems, there is no better way.

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There is actually a spot under "file" that says "Document details", and if you click that, it will show you the creation date and who it was done by.

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