In this post, I will show you the steps to disable News and Interests, Widgets using Intune. News and Interests feature was introduced with Windows 10, starting from version 1909 via the 2021 monthly update cadence. It has also been integrated as a widget on Windows 11 devices. According to Microsoft, this feature (weather and news feed on the taskbar) was designed to offer quick access to weather, news, and information pertinent to the individual user.
This customizable widget can be managed on Windows devices through the Settings app. While this feature is useful for many users, it may not be as useful for enterprise users who may not use it frequently.
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Disable News and Interests on Windows 10 and Widgets on Windows 11
You can create a single profile that targets both Windows 10 and Windows 11 devices, which is the simplest operational approach. Windows 10 devices apply only the Windows 10–specific setting, while Windows 11 devices apply only the Windows 11–specific setting (the other will show as not applicable).
Alternatively, you can create two separate Settings Catalog profiles: one targeting Windows 10 devices to disable News and Interests, and another targeting Windows 11 devices to disable Widgets.
- Sign in to the Intune admin center > Devices > Configuration > + Create > New Policy.
- Platform: Windows 10 and later. Profile type: Settings Catalog.
- Basics: Provide a name and description of the policy.
- Configuration settings: Click on + Add settings and search for news and interest in the settings picker. You will find two settings, Feeds and Widgets, and select Enable News and Interests and Allow Widgets.
If your organization contains only Windows 10 devices, select Feeds > Enable News and Interests setting only. Allow Widget settings is applicable to Windows 11 devices only.
- Set Enable News and Interests and Allow Widgets to Not allowed.
- Scope tags (optional): A scope tag in Intune is an RBAC label that you assign to resources such as policies, apps, and devices to control which administrators can view and manage them. For more information, see How to use scope tags in Intune.
- Assignments: Assign the policy to Microsoft Entra security groups that include the target users or devices. As a best practice, start with a small pilot group, and once validated, expand the assignment more broadly. For guidance on assignment strategy, see Intune assignments: User groups vs. Device groups.
- Review + create: Review the deployment summary and click Create.
Sync Intune Policies
The device check-in process might not begin immediately. If you’re testing this policy on a test device, you can manually kickstart Intune sync from the device itself or remotely through the Intune admin center.
Alternatively, you can use PowerShell to force the Intune sync on Windows devices. Restarting the device is another way to trigger the Intune device check-in process.
Monitoring Intune Policy Deployment
- Sign in to the Intune admin center > Devices > Configuration.
- Select the Device Configuration profile you want to work with, and at the top of the page, you’ll see a quick view of the Success, Failure, Conflict, Not Applicable, and In Progress status.
- Click on View report to access more detailed information.
End User Experience
Once the profile is successfully applied to the target devices, the News and Interests widget will be disabled on Windows 10 devices. If you also disabled Allow Widgets for Windows 11 devices, verify that widgets are now disabled on those devices as well.
- On a Windows 10 device, follow the below steps to check and confirm:
- Press the Win + I keys to open the Settings app
- Click on Personalization > Taskbar
- Scroll down on the page to find News and Interests settings
- On a Windows 11 device, follow below steps to check and confirm:
- Press the Win + I keys to open the Settings app.
- Click on Personalization > Taskbar.
- Widgets will be turned off and greyed out.
Disable News and Interests on Windows 10 devices manually
- Press Win + I to open the Settings app.
- Click on Personalization > Taskbar.
- Scroll down the page to find the News and Interests settings.
- Toggle off the setting Show news and interests on the taskbar.
- You don’t have to visit the Settings app to turn off News and Interests. A quicker way is to right-click on the taskbar, locate the News and Interests option, and click Turn off to disable the News and Interests widget on your Windows 10 device’s taskbar.
Disable Widgets on Windows 11 devices manually
- Press the Win + I keys to open the Settings app.
- Click on Personalization > Taskbar.
- Toggle off the Widgets setting under Taskbar Items.
Disable News and Interests and Widgets using Registry
You can disable the News and Interests on Windows 10 and widgets on Windows 11 devices by modifying the Windows registry.
On Windows 10 devices [For All Users]
- Press the Win + R keys together to open the Run dialog box.
- Type regedit and press Enter to open Registry Editor.
- Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Windows Feeds. On the right-hand side, update EnableFeeds registry entry value to 0 to disable News and Interests from the taskbar.
- Restart your Windows 10 device so that this change can take effect.
Disable News and Interests for all users on Windows 10 devices
reg add "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Windows Feeds" /v EnableFeeds /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
On Windows 10 devices [For One User]
The EnableFeeds registry entry allows you to disable the News and Interest widget at the device level, affecting all users who sign in on that device. If you want to disable News and Interests for specific users rather than all users, you can make changes at the HKCU (HKEY_CURRENT_USER) registry level.
- Press the Win + R keys together to open the Run dialog box.
- Type regedit and press Enter to open Registry Editor.
- Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Feeds and update the ShellFeedsTaskbarViewMode registry entry value to 2.
- This change will occur when users sign out/sign in on Windows devices.
Disable Widgets on Windows 11 devices [For All Users]
To disable Widgets on Windows 11 devices for all users, follow the below steps:
- Press the Win + R keys together to open the Run dialog box.
- Type regedit and press Enter to open Registry Editor.
- Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Dsh and create a new DWORD (32-bit) registry entry called AllowNewsAndInterests and set its value to 0. This will disable Widgets for all users. AllowNewsAndInterests registry entry may already exist for you, so you don’t have to create it; just set its value to 0 to disable it.
- Restart your Windows 11 device so that this change can take effect.
Disable Widgets on Windows 11 devices for all users
reg add "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Dsh" /v AllowNewsAndInterests /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
- After restarting the device, navigate to Settings App > Personalization > Taskbar. You will notice that the Widgets taskbar item is disabled and greyed out. Since we created the registry setting at the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE level, this change will apply to all users on the device.
Conclusion
Deploy the below settings catalog settings to enable or disable news and interests and widgets on Windows 10 and Windows 11 devices.
- Disable Windows 10 News and interests using Enable News and Interests = Not Allowed.
- Disable Windows 11 Widgets using Allow Widgets = Not Allowed.
Good article. From an enterprise perspective it’s a shame that Microsoft does not provide a means of tailoring the ‘News and Interests’ feature such that enterprise admins could centrally define the desired News content and widgets for their userbase.