how to hide/disable Choose a theme for your Microsoft 365 apps

Question

how to hide/disable Choose a theme for your Microsoft 365 apps

Pavel yannara Mirochnitchenko 13,336 MVP

New Intune Autopilot machines are giving this pop up during new user opening first time any office app.

I already tried "Default Office theme (User)" in Enable or Disable state in Settings Catalog, it makes no differences.

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Pavel yannara Mirochnitchenko 13,336 Reputation points MVP

2024-12-17T13:16:21.96+00:00

I have tested this several times and clearly see, that the differense here is Semi-Annual vs. Current Channel distribution. I don't see this window pop-up with Semi-Annual, but I always see this with Current Channel. That policy in settings catalog about themes has no effect.
Crystal-MSFT 53,991 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff

2024-12-18T07:53:42.25+00:00

@Pavel yannara Mirochnitchenko . In my test, the manual install Microsoft 365 is current channel. But I don't get the prompt. I will choose another device to deploy this app via Intune to see if the result is different.
NB 5 Reputation points

2025-02-04T02:19:40.8733333+00:00

in HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Common\PromoDialogShown set FluentWelcomeDialogShown to 1 (DWORD).
John 20 Reputation points

2025-02-04T20:18:38.6033333+00:00

Thanks to NB's post, I was able to roam this setting for VDI. It kept popping up every non-persistent session. Roaming HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Common\PromoDialogShown set FluentWelcomeDialogShown to 1 (DWORD) as able to keep that window suppressed after the selecting the theme option.

3 answers

Your answer

Pavel yannara Mirochnitchenko 13,336 Reputation points MVP

2024-12-17T13:16:21.96+00:00

I have tested this several times and clearly see, that the differense here is Semi-Annual vs. Current Channel distribution. I don't see this window pop-up with Semi-Annual, but I always see this with Current Channel. That policy in settings catalog about themes has no effect.
Crystal-MSFT 53,991 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff

2024-12-18T07:53:42.25+00:00

@Pavel yannara Mirochnitchenko . In my test, the manual install Microsoft 365 is current channel. But I don't get the prompt. I will choose another device to deploy this app via Intune to see if the result is different.
NB 5 Reputation points

2025-02-04T02:19:40.8733333+00:00

in HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Common\PromoDialogShown set FluentWelcomeDialogShown to 1 (DWORD).
John 20 Reputation points

2025-02-04T20:18:38.6033333+00:00

Thanks to NB's post, I was able to roam this setting for VDI. It kept popping up every non-persistent session. Roaming HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Common\PromoDialogShown set FluentWelcomeDialogShown to 1 (DWORD) as able to keep that window suppressed after the selecting the theme option.

Answer 1

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Answer 2

Crystal-MSFT 53,991 Microsoft External Staff

@Pavel yannara Mirochnitchenko , Thanks for posting in Q&A. Based on my testing, when I download and install the following Microsoft 365 app in the following link. I don't get the "Choose a theme for your Microsoft 365 apps" prompt. Could you let me know how you deploy the Microsoft 365 app?

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/download-office?msockid=1e0bddf9f234641717dbcc33f3b165cc

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Pavel yannara Mirochnitchenko 13,336 Reputation points MVP

2024-12-17T09:57:50.2966667+00:00

With MS Intune and configuring it also with Intune. I am now testing differences between current channel (required by Copilot) vs. Semi-Annual Channel.

Answer 3

Crystal-MSFT 53,991 Microsoft External Staff

@Pavel yannara Mirochnitchenko , I have tested to deploy Microsoft 365 app via Intune and configure the default theme in Settings Catalog. On my testing, I don't get the "Choose a theme for your Microsoft 365 apps" prompt either. Here are my configurations:

User's image

For the configuration, I find it shows applied successfully in Intune but under word option, I find the office theme is not select as colorful but blank. It seems this configuration policy can't take affect on Microsoft 365 app.

User's image

Find the following link to configure Microsoft 365 theme, I will test to see if it can work.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/admin/setup/customize-your-organization-theme?view=o365-worldwide

Pavel yannara Mirochnitchenko 13,336 Reputation points MVP

2024-12-18T18:08:31.2466667+00:00

@Crystal-MSFT thanks for your efford. How about if you also add Current Channel setting in Settings Catalog, we have that too.

Btw, my own lab was on Semi-Annual Channel and I changed in on-the-fly to Current Channel with SC policy. After that, on existing machines, Powerpoint and Word started to ask for Theme :D
Crystal-MSFT 53,991 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff

2024-12-19T08:38:33.9966667+00:00

@Pavel yannara Mirochnitchenko ,I have set a Settings Catalog policy as below. But still not get prompt when I open word, Excel.
Pavel yannara Mirochnitchenko 13,336 Reputation points MVP

2024-12-19T18:14:34.6333333+00:00

@Crystal-MSFT new or existing user? Have you tried this when a new user signs into Windows and starts using Office for the first time, right?
Crystal-MSFT 53,991 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff

2024-12-20T01:51:23.57+00:00

@Pavel yannara Mirochnitchenko , I tried with an existing user. But choose one newly enrolled device and sign in the windows to open the word or Excel for the first time.

Also I find the theme windows prompt only when I go to Option, General to check the default theme on my testing device.

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how to hide/disable Choose a theme for your Microsoft 365 apps

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