Microsoft CoPilot

[Skylark56]

Noticed something creeping up recently on the latest build of Windows 11 in regards to CoPilot. Is there a way either through Group Policy or a registry setting that anybody knows about to remove it from the Taskbar? I want a clean as possible taskbar and it has auto added itself for student profiles so they can access and use it and I want to disencourage this as of right now.

 

According to some threads I have seen they ask you to add/edit the following REG codes:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\ ShowCopilotButton

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsCopilot\ TurnOffWindowsCopilot

 

Both of these according to other forum posts no longer seem to work and I am racking my head around how to remove it. You can easily right click the taskbar and select Taskbar Settings and disable it manually but this isn't feasible for students and staff. Any tricks anybody has gotten to remove it?

[Rob_D]

If you've got the Windows 11 ADMX templates installed you should be able to enable GPO > User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Copilot > Disable CoPilot

This works for us.

[DavR]

Anecdotally, we heard from another school that CoPilot can be a bit... invasive... with regards to data. Accessing data sources which the user doesn't have permissions to see.

 

I don't know how true or otherwise, but it's enough for us to disable it in our Windows 11 policies, as shown above. We'll consider releasing it again if anyone comes to us with a reasonable usage case for it.

[markberry]

Anecdotally, we heard from another school that CoPilot can be a bit... invasive... with regards to data. Accessing data sources which the user doesn't have permissions to see.

 

I don't know how true or otherwise, but it's enough for us to disable it in our Windows 11 policies, as shown above. We'll consider releasing it again if anyone comes to us with a reasonable usage case for it.

 

There are some changes you can make to force it use your school login and M365 Commercial Data Protection policies. Details are in the Microsoft Education AI Toolkit, or details here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-gb/copilot/manage

 

As for accessing internal data sources, I've found the issues are usually around staff creating an area without setting the correct permissions. A SharePoint site where all staff have read access for example, then they wonder why all staff can see a document they've just created and saved there!

[robintech]

Haven't changed ours and Commercial Data Protection is turned on which seems to be the default for Education so Staff can use it if they want, luckily it seems to break with the WebSockets it uses going through Smoothwall so can block it by not applying an exception for Students or just restricting times it can be used.

[chazzy2501]

it seems with the latest windows the GPO (to disable copilot) is ignored as they moved copilot to edge or something so the shell extensions all are enabled again..

 

They did this with proxy settings a while back as well... FFS MS the DEFAULT FOR NEW %HIT IS OFF

 

[Olliedawg]

2 hours ago, chazzy2501 said:

it seems with the latest windows the GPO (to disable copilot) is ignored as they moved copilot to edge or something so the shell extensions all are enabled again..

 

They did this with proxy settings a while back as well... FFS MS the DEFAULT FOR NEW %HIT IS OFF

 

I noticed this too. Copilot appearing in the taskbar again with the GPO in place & enabled 

[DavR]

4 hours ago, chazzy2501 said:

it seems with the latest windows the GPO (to disable copilot) is ignored as they moved copilot to edge or something so the shell extensions all are enabled again..

 

They did this with proxy settings a while back as well... FFS MS the DEFAULT FOR NEW %HIT IS OFF

 

 

Do we mean the Copilot chatbot built into Microsoft Edge browser? I've just been reading around, and it looks like with recent versions of Edge, they've changed which settings control that.

 

However, there are new GP templates that allow you to turn it off in Edge browser. You need to update your ADMX files for Edge, then the new setting is Admin Templates | Microsoft Edge "Control whether Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat shows in the Microsoft Edge for Business toolbar". This takes effect from Edge version 139.

 

It replaces "Show Hubs Sidebar" which is now deprecated as of Edge version 141.

 

I can't find a good GPO reference, but this one covers the InTune settings, which are basically the same controls - https://blog-en.topedia.com/2025/09/new-intune-policy-to-disable-the-copilot-chat-button-in-edge-for-business/

 

 

 

[chazzy2501]

No, this is the taskbar copilot. yay!

[DavR]

1 hour ago, chazzy2501 said:

No, this is the taskbar copilot. yay!

 

Oof, bad luck. Not seeing anything on ours yet - Win 11 Enterprise 24H2 - it's staying shut off.

 

Mind if ask which version you're seeing it on?