Last month, Microsoft announced that it planned to remove “unnecessary” Copilot features in Windows 11. The news was a bit shocking to say the least: Microsoft has been one of the biggest proponents of generative AI, pushing the technology into more and more corners of its apps and OS despite negative feedback from users. Now, it looks like the company is paying attention, and is actually sticking to its word.

As observed by The Verge’s Tom Warren.Microsoft has already started removing some “unnecessary” Copilot buttons from some Windows apps. Warren noted that the latest Windows Insider version of the Notepad app is missing the Copilot button. In its place, Microsoft has added a “Writing Tools” menu. The same is the case with the snapping tool: when you select an area to take a snapshot, you won’t find the Copilot button.

It’s a small start, but at least the company is Starting the removal process. In his announcement last month, Pawan Davalori (Microsoft’s president of Windows and Devices) revealed that the company would remove Copilot from both Notepad and the snapping tool, but also Photos and Widgets. If the trend continues, expect these apps to lose their Copilot button further.

The keyword here is really “button”. As Warren highlighted for The Verge, Microsoft seems to be largely keeping the AI ​​features to itself. Notepad still has Microsoft’s AI writing tools under “Writing Tools,” if users still want to access those options. But by removing the big Copilot option, users who want nothing to do with AI in apps like Notepad can easily avoid them. Indeed, this is proof that Microsoft’s “in your face” approach to AI integration has indeed backfired. It doesn’t help the company’s case that, until last week, Microsoft’s official terms of service said Copilot was “for entertainment purposes only.”

Removing the Copilot buttons from the software is fairly easy. It’s another thing to deal with the Copilot button stuck on the new “Copilot+ PCs”. Microsoft included this button as part of its dedication to this new technology to manufacturers, but now that it’s being pushed back a bit, it leaves these PCs in an awkward spot. Putting a Copilot key on a laptop always seemed like an odd choice when it wasn’t clear how many users would actually want to use the Copilot features in the first place. If you don’t care about Microsoft’s AI, at least you can refactor it to make it a little more useful.