Turn off "Draft with Copilot" - No Copilot tab in options

Question

Microsoft took it upon itself to force Copilot down my throat in MS Word and now I have this dumb cursor in all of my documents as I edit documents. Apparently, I have no way to turn it off.

According to its own help, I need to go to File, Options and click on the Copilot tab. There is no Copilot tab.

I have checked and I am running the latest version of Word.

Answer 1

Hi @JohnG, 

The reason you cannot find a Copilot tab in Word > File > Options is because Microsoft only shows that tab when the full Microsoft 365 Copilot license is enabled on the account and activated inside the Word desktop app. If you are not licensed for Copilot, or if your organization has not fully rolled out that feature, the Copilot settings panel will not appear. 

To troubleshoot further, you can try these steps: 

1/ Save a copy of the file locally on your computer and close the cloud version. 

2/ Turn off AutoSave in the top‑left corner of Word and reopen the document. 

3/ Check whether the “ghost cursor” still appears. 

4/ Go to File > Options > General and try enabling or disabling “Enable Live Preview” or “Update document content while dragging” to see if the cursor behavior changes. 

5/ Restart Word. 

Note: Please understand that as a forum moderator, my primary goal is to provide helpful guidance and support through general troubleshooting steps. While I don’t have access to internal systems or test devices required to resolve backend/account issues, I truly appreciate your understanding of these limitations.  

I hope you find this information helpful. If anything is unclear, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me. 

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Answer 2

To remove or disable the “Draft with Copilot” experience when the Copilot tab is not available in Word Options, use one of these supported methods from the documentation and Q&A:

1. Turn off Copilot via privacy settings (works even without a Copilot tab) On Windows Word:
   1. Go to File > Account > Account Privacy > Manage Settings.
   2. Under Connected experiences, clear Turn on experiences that analyze your content.
   3. Select OK, then close and restart Word.
   This turns off Copilot features that analyze document content across Word, PowerPoint, and Excel.
2. Use the “Enable Copilot” checkbox (when it becomes available in your build) The dedicated Copilot options page is only present starting with specific versions:
   • Word for Windows: Version 2412 or later.
   • Word for Mac: Version 16.93 or later.
   When running one of these versions or later:
   1. In Word, go to File > Options > Copilot.
   2. Clear the Enable Copilot checkbox.
   3. Select OK, then close and restart Word.
   This disables Copilot in Word on that device without changing privacy settings.
3. Update Word to pick up Copilot fixes (for intrusive in‑document icons/cursors) Several users reporting intrusive Copilot icons/cursors in Word have had them removed by updating to newer builds. For example, the 16.103.1 update removed an intrusive Copilot logo in the document window for affected channels. Ensure Office is updated to the latest build available on the update channel in use; once updated, restart Word and re-check the behavior.

If the Copilot tab is missing today, use method 1 (privacy settings) to disable Copilot-driven content analysis immediately, then update Word so that the Copilot options page and any related fixes (such as removal of intrusive icons) are available.

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References:

• Turn off Copilot in Microsoft 365 apps
• How to disable co-pilot on Mac - Microsoft Q&A
• How do I get rid of the Copilot icon on Docs as I'm working on them? - Microsoft Q&A
• How to remove Copilot from Word in Office Home & Business 2024? - Microsoft Q&A
• How to remove new Copilot in-document icon in Microsoft Word? - Microsoft Q&A