Windows 10 includes Cortana, Microsoft’s own version of a digital assistant, similar to Apple’s Siri, yet with her own unique personality (or, as much as an AI can have one).
The Windows 10 taskbar shows Cortana’s search box by default, and when you click on it for the first time, she’ll give you the option to enable it. You can just skip it and select ‘I’m not interested’. Nevertheless, if you’re reading this then you probably tested Cortana and decided you want to turn off the service.
You can quickly disable Cortana in Windows 10, and I’ll take you through all the necessary steps.
Easily disable Cortana in Windows 10
If you don’t want to completely disable Cortana, but you’d like to simply get rid of its search box, follow this quick guide. Otherwise, follow the instructions below.
Type ‘Cortana‘ in Windows 10’s desktop search box and select the top result (Cortana and Search settings) or simply click on the Notebook icon (the third one down) and select Settings.
Switch the first toggle to off position to disable Cortana. Technically, this turns off the Cortana feature on your Windows 10, but one problem remains.
A message will be displayed, explaining that Cortana’s information on your computer or tablet was removed but it could still be stored online.
Delete your personal data from Cortana
To do this, select the ‘Manage what Cortana knows about me in the cloud‘ option.
You might see a pop-up dialog prompting you to choose a web browser in which you want to finalize this task. Select the one you want to use.
If you’re prompted to log in with your Microsoft account, enter your credentials and you’ll be taken to the Bing personalization settings web page.
There, you can wipe the history for saved places, search, personal information and so on. You can manage these option one-by-one or choose the easy way out and hit the ‘Clear‘ button at the bottom of the screen to remove everything at once.
With this final step, you’ve managed to disable Cortana in Windows 10, as well as delete any data it may have stored regarding you and your device in the cloud.
