I have some older Numbers documents that need to be reopened in an older version of numbers (08 or 09). Is this even possible? I had a computer breakdown and the files were recovered, but I cannot open them in my current Numbers app.
MacBook Air 13″, macOS 15.3
I haven't seen many problems with the current version of Numbers opening older Numbers '09 files, so I'm concerned there may be something more amiss.
In either case, the version of Numbers is tied to the OS version, so you'll first need to find a machine with an older OS on it. If I recall, Mac OS High Sierra is the latest version that will support Numbers '09 (a 32-bit app, since all future OS versions were 64-bit only).
Out of curiosity, what happens when you try to open the documents in a newer version Numbers?
I haven't seen many problems with the current version of Numbers opening older Numbers '09 files, so I'm concerned there may be something more amiss.
In either case, the version of Numbers is tied to the OS version, so you'll first need to find a machine with an older OS on it. If I recall, Mac OS High Sierra is the latest version that will support Numbers '09 (a 32-bit app, since all future OS versions were 64-bit only).
Out of curiosity, what happens when you try to open the documents in a newer version Numbers?
Yeah, you're right - hard to keep the OS version numbers straight in my head :)
Wasn't Mojave was the version where they added nagware to warn users that their app needed updating to work with future OS versions? but they would still run.
Either way, the underlying premise still stands: If you want to run Numbers '09 you need an older machine, and and old OS version to run it.
Numbers & Pages '09, v2.3 & v4.3, work in Mojave, macOS 10.14.6. Mojave is the last OS to support 32-bit apps. I have no problem opening a Numbers 2.3 file in Numbers 14.3 in Sonoma, macOS 14.7.4.
Downloading older versions of Numbers
