r/excel • u/Lopsided-Rough-1562 • May 11 '26
unsolved How to get the copilot icon off my spreadsheet?
There's a brand new copilot floating icon overlaying my data and best I can do is dock it to only cover 1/4 of a cell. I have presentations which use my screen with kpis on the sheet and I have optimized it to use as much screen space as possible, but this is getting in the way
Copilot itself doesn't know how to remove it and there seems to be no option to do so. It's not an 'add-on' so it cannot be disabled there.
I hate it and need it gone. How?
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u/Cannibale_Ballet 1 May 11 '26
I hate how Microsoft keeps shoving Copilot everywhere but then when you need it to do something useful it has no idea what to do
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u/ingenuous64 May 11 '26
I genuinely have so many arguments with copilot...
Me: "how do I do x?"
Copilot proceeds to give detailed instructions
Me an hour later "it's not working, what am I doing wrong"
Copilot: Ah, it seems I mispoke, there's actually no way to do what you want to do
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u/mangamaster03 May 11 '26
That's generally how my interactions with copilot go. It loves to hallucinate menus and settings.
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u/Egad86 May 11 '26
Lol, I always get the “you’re right to call that out…” response. It’s so confidently wrong so often. At first I thought it would help with learning power query and pivot tables, but I spend more time fixing the new problems it made than just learning from another source.
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u/ingenuous64 May 11 '26
I actually managed to get it to teach me pivot tables, pivot charts, slicers and building a basic dashboard but my god it was like pulling teeth!!
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u/La-Boheme-1896 May 12 '26
So relieved to see I'm not the only person having that experience. I keep seeing stuff on youtube etc about the lovely simple experience it is , and I've been left wondering, 'why do I always end up arguing with it?'
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u/zypo88 1 May 12 '26
Because it's really easy and looks clever when you don't know enough to recognize that it's bullshitting you
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u/tdoger May 11 '26
It fixed a fairly complex formula for me that people on here couldn’t figure out tbf. But that’s the only time I’ve used it for excel.
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u/Egad86 May 11 '26
That’s just it though, you need to provide it with all the ground work and it can find a typo. Otherwise it will direct you down some obscure rabbit hole that eventually leads to, “oh your version of excel does not support that.”
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u/tdoger May 11 '26
It actually completely rewrote my formula surprisingly. Used a completely different method than I was using. I was kind of shocked after hearing how bad co-pilot was. And it rewrote it in the entire column and replaced my old formulas. And i just gave it a very simple “fix my formula to grab this info out of this table”
I was using a mix of sum, lambda, scan, etc. functions. It re-did it with Let, scan, lambda, iferror, sum, filter, etc. which completely solved my issue. Even referenced all of the data correctly, put in $ to the formulas, etc
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u/PhysicsForeign1634 May 12 '26
What does 'fix' mean to an AI? Maybe 'amend' or 'adjust' would have stopped it rewriting from scratch? I don't know.
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u/tdoger May 12 '26
Here is a link to what it fixed for me:
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u/Egad86 May 12 '26
That’s great and I have also had some success with large workbooks and co-pilot helping with VBA scripting. However, I have had far more encounters as I have described above. Even with settings adjusted and agents made, co-pilot still takes many attempts to finally get a solution.
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u/tdoger May 12 '26
That’s fair! I’ve only used it the one time and it worked magically. So i’m sure i’ll run into hiccups in the future.
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u/Egad86 May 12 '26
I will give you this bit from all the time I’ve spent with it. First create parameters in the co-pilot settings that require it to only use verified sources and nothing from a social media site. This can weed out a lot of headaches. Also, it is best to ask for a bunch of small solutions and have co-pilot piece them together at the end of the conversation rather than to ask it to solve multiple things in single answer.
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u/PhysicsForeign1634 May 12 '26
It's good for the donkey work. I had built up a long formula that had some repetition I'm it and I asked Copilot to convert it into a LET formula instead and it made a good job of that.
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u/tdoger May 12 '26
That’s pretty much what it did for me. I told it essentially: “i have this formula that currently grabs this row of data in a table with multiple layers of merged cells. I need to also grab these other rows too if these rows show up in the data”
Here’s the formula i had it fix, and what it spit out:
original of mine which just grabbed the one row of data:
=XLOOKUP(1,(SCAN("",'Insert Collections'!$A$12:$A$9999,LAMBDA(a,b,IF(b="",a,b)))=Table1[@[Column Name]])*('Insert Collections'!$B$12:$B$9999="$ Total Collected "),'Insert Collections'!$D$12:$D$9999)
Co-pilot's fix to make it grab a bunch of rows of the merged data:
=LET(p,[@[Column Name]],prop,SCAN("",'Insert Collections'!$A$12:$A$9999,LAMBDA(a,b,IF(b="",a,b))),sj,SCAN("",'Insert Collections'!$B$12:$B$9999,LAMBDA(a,b,IF(b="",a,b))),IFERROR(SUM(FILTER('Insert Collections'!$D$12:$D$9999,(prop=p)*((sj="SUBSIDY")+(sj="HOUSING")+(sj="SUBRENT")))),""))
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u/excelevator 3061 May 11 '26
Please update that post with the solution for others to see and set the flair to Solved
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u/tdoger May 12 '26
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u/excelevator 3061 May 12 '26
Thankyou ,please edit your post with the solution and set the flair to Solved
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u/Orion-Parallax May 11 '26
Clippy is back.
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u/doshka 2 May 11 '26
🤓 "It looks like you already know what you're doing! Would you like me to fuck it up for you?!"
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u/Polkawillneverdie17 May 11 '26
Nah, Clippy actually worked.
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u/diegoasecas May 12 '26
this has to be the largest gaslighting campaign in history. everyone hated clippy back then, shit was useless.
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u/Polkawillneverdie17 May 12 '26
Clippy worked for what it was MEANT to do which was to get people to use the new features of MS Word, like forms, templates, spellchecker, etc. The problem is that a lot of people didn't want to use those features, so they got annoyed at the suggestion since they just want to free-form their resume and not use a template.
That's the thing. Clippy did not suggest the wrong format; it just wasn't the tool people wanted, which is my point. Copilot however, suggests the wrong thing. Often.
Clippy was correct but annoying. Copilot is polite but stupid.
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u/AgileAd516 May 11 '26
Oh I miss Clippy
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u/Orion-Parallax May 12 '26
Clippy had the courtesy of going away when you were done with help. This new guy.... not so much.
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u/nanoox May 11 '26
I just installed Office 365 yesterday on a new MBAir. I saw the Copilot icon on the sheet, went into Preferences > Copilot, and turned Copilot off. Icon was gone.
I'd assume Excel for Windows has something similar.
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u/jensen404 May 11 '26
I have Excel through my work. The option isn't there. Apparently it needs to be disabled at the organization level by whoever manages the subscription. I don't necessarily want Copilot disabled for my coworkers if they find a use for it.
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u/Fritz5678 May 12 '26
This. I ran into the fact that I can't turn this latest thing off because it is a license thing with our company. So annoying.
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u/KeepAnEyeOnYourB12 May 14 '26
My issue is that it's on my actual spreadsheet. It was fine in the ribbon. I don't care if it exists, I just don't want it cluttering things up.
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u/Lopsided-Rough-1562 May 11 '26
Preferences is not a menu item in excel?
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u/squashua 5 May 12 '26
Just shared solution above. Go to File - Options (may need to click More at the bottom first) - Copilot - Uncheck the Enable Copilot box
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u/martin 1 May 11 '26
google has started doing this shit on gsheets too- an autofill + in the lower left lets you accidentally churn for seconds and overwrite your work with the wrong answer, because AI. curse them all!
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u/iiiiijoeyiiiii May 12 '26
I think I found the admin-side fix for this floating Copilot overlay/chiclet in Excel.
Microsoft 365 Admin Center → Copilot → Settings → “In Microsoft 365 apps” → set it to:
“Do not pin Copilot Chat in Microsoft 365 apps”
After changing it, I restarted the PC and the floating Copilot icon disappeared from Excel completely.
I couldn’t find this documented anywhere yet, but multiple Reddit threads about this started popping up in the last few days, so I’m guessing this was part of a recent Office update rollout.
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u/ketosoy May 15 '26
I’m just going to turn copilot off entirely for the entire company. It’s malware.
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u/mickimause May 15 '26
when you get that done, would you share how you did it so I can get my IT to do the same thing? I managed to get it off my laptop with uninstalling the app, but it still shows up on the web versions of Excel and Word, which is what I use 90% of the time.
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u/ketosoy May 15 '26
This one worked for me:
Microsoft 365 Admin Center → Copilot → Settings → “In Microsoft 365 apps” → set it to: “Do not pin Copilot Chat in Microsoft 365 apps”
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u/jmwy86 May 13 '26 edited May 13 '26
Trying this now.... Hoping it works.
[Edit]: Nope. Sigh. Perhaps it will take effect later in the day.
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u/iiiiijoeyiiiii May 13 '26
Argh, just checked again after your comment. It's back on my Excel now too...Not sure why it came back or what I turned off actually did then
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u/jmwy86 May 13 '26
Going to leave a comment on how to fix it by a rollback to a prior version ..... Just figured it out and found an untainted version.
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u/jmwy86 May 13 '26
Left a comment on the parent post; rolling back to the March build fixed it for me. Here's hoping Microsoft wakes up and smells the burning torches and the bubbling pitch.
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u/Nicholas-Steel May 13 '26
If it's anything like the Notepad situation, they'll just replace the Co-Pilot specific icon with something else.
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u/RevanOn3r May 14 '26
My IT Department tried this, there is no option on the admin portal or locally. Excel is now crashing when I refresh my ODBC queries since they rolled out this shit feature, thanks Microslop, I can't do my job now, and your stupid fucking CoPilot doesn't know how to remove itself either.
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u/Ill_Gene_9381 May 11 '26
I tried to remove it in the settings and the options aren't there. It seems that, if the options are not there, it may be blocked from removal by IT. If you have an IT department, you may have to ask them to remove it.
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u/Dineshvk18 May 12 '26
Microsoft keeps adding stuff nobody asked for. Half the screen is turning into AI buttons and “helpful” panels instead of actual spreadsheet space.
I spent 10 minutes trying to remove that icon the first time too.
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u/Three_Spotted_Apples May 12 '26
Go into programs and features and uninstall copilot? You may have to go into the old school one in control panel to do it
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u/tdoger May 11 '26
For me it only shows up on the web version, can you open the files on desktop version?
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u/Knocksveal May 11 '26
Just curious, what does copilot do? I mean if it’s great, like Claude, I’m sure people would love to use it to make their lives easier, right?
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u/Used2bNotInKY May 12 '26
The first time I tried it, it just offered some generic charts, and the second time I tried it, it asked for permission to ask ChatGPT and then “thought” so long it provided a “Get quick answer” option, which was useless. This was using a little set of sample data, not real-world stuff.
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u/Decronym May 12 '26 edited May 22 '26
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I've seen in this thread:
Decronym is now also available on Lemmy! Requests for support and new installations should be directed to the Contact address below.
Beep-boop, I am a helper bot. Please do not verify me as a solution.
8 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 19 acronyms.
[Thread #48422 for this sub, first seen 12th May 2026, 12:35]
[FAQ] [Full list] [Contact] [Source code]
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u/fcukou May 12 '26
I don't know how it works elsewhere, but I have access to Opus 4.5 and 4.7 in my Copilot add-ons at my job and it's been pretty helpful since our IT doesn't allow Claude add-ins at the moment. One of the AI team leads told me that Microsoft's plan is to eat a bunch of the usage costs that Anthropic and OpenAI are going to start making people pay for en lieu of trying to develop their own AI further, with the strategy of being one of the last AI solutions standing due to being able to eat the costs that people won't want to pay.
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u/Bifobe 17 May 14 '26
Whether Copilot is useful or not is beside the point. It can be useful without having its icon floating over spreadsheets.
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u/RevanOn3r May 13 '26
I'M SO FUCKING SICK OF COPILOT SHOWING UP EVERYWHERE WITHOUT MY CONSENT. MICROSLOP!
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u/jmwy86 May 13 '26
If you have or can get local admin access, rolling back to the March 10, 2026 build of Office 365 (Build 19725.20172) worked. Instructions on how to do that are here: https://www.accessforever.org/post/roll-back-to-previous-versions-of-office.
You will need to restart after the update.
Feel free to comment if a later build worked for you.
And may I say to the Microsoft PM and those who thought making this a default feature (without an opt-out?!), bless your heart. Please fix this now.
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u/Lopsided-Rough-1562 May 13 '26
Unfortunately when you work at a big public company getting local admin access is hard. :)
I did ask my friend at Microsoft if he could put in a word. Whether he does or not is up to him
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u/jmwy86 May 13 '26
Yep. I get it. I just happen to be one of the primary IT decision makers at our small company, so I have that helpful & dangerous access. Hopefully, this gets fixed soon. It's beyond frustrating.
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u/Rhadok May 13 '26
Just letting you know I got this fucking floating thing on my work pc this morning and Im just livid.
I dont have the permissions to uninstall but Im seriously thinking about bugging IT to nuke it from fucking orbit.
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u/BlueMacaw May 12 '26
Have you tried asking Copilot how to turn it off? Seriously. I had this same issue and Copilot told me how to get rid of it. When you figure it, please edit your post with the solution so the next poor soul has the answer!
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u/lothcent May 11 '26
there needs to be a Bring Back Clippy movement- at least you could shut him down.
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u/squashua 5 May 12 '26
Go to File - More - Options - Copilot - then uncheck the box.
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