How one can utterly take away this annoying storage app from Home windows 11

In case you occur to have a Microsoft Account (the account you employ to log in to Outlook / Hotmail, Xbox, Home windows, Workplace 365, and extra), then you definitely even have a OneDrive account. OneDrive has lengthy served as Microsoft’s first-party cloud storage offering, with deep hooks into the corporate’s broader software program and providers ecosystem.

OneDrive is woven into the material of the Windows 11 operating system for PCs, which is beneficial if you happen to’re an avid consumer of all-things Microsoft, and annoying if you happen to’re not a fan or an energetic consumer of the service. Fortunately, it is easy sufficient to decouple Home windows and OneDrive — simply do not inform Microsoft you are doing so.

What’s OneDrive?

Microsoft’s first-party cloud storage service

In brief, OneDrive is a cloud-based storage service supplier owned and operated by Microsoft. The utility capabilities equally to Google Drive, Apple iCloud, Dropbox, and different web storage providers, permitting you to put information and folders on a distant server for handy entry on any machine and whereas wherever on the planet.

OneDrive started life all the best way again in 2007, recognized on the time as SkyDrive. The service was later built-in deeper into the Microsoft Account expertise, whereas additionally changing into deeply intertwined with the Home windows working system for automated PC backups. Right this moment, OneDrive might be accessed throughout Home windows 11, the online, Android, iOS, iPadOS, and macOS.

As with different cloud storage providers, OneDrive is a handy device for storing and accessing information with out having to depend on carrying round USB thumb drives, exterior HDDs and SSDs, optical discs, SD playing cards, or the like. In fact, the service is not with out its issues: many customers mistrust Microsoft and really feel uncomfortable storing their private information on the corporate’s servers, whereas others discover OneDrive’s Home windows 11 integration to be intrusive, complicated, or downright infuriating.

How one can take away OneDrive from Home windows 11

The cloud storage service might be (largely) gutted from the OS with out an excessive amount of trouble

When you’ve got no use for Microsoft’s OneDrive in your Home windows 11 PC, there are several measures you can take to take away the service altogether. To begin with, observe these steps to unlink your account out of your PC (which disables cloud syncing and removes native entry to cloud information):

1. Click on or faucet on the OneDrive icon inside the system tray (decrease right-hand nook) to open the OneDrive flyout. From right here, hit the cog glyph icon adopted by Settings.
2. Subsequent, navigate to Account > Unlink this PC > Unlink account.

Subsequent, you will wish to delete the OneDrive utility out of your PC. This may be executed in various methods, however this is how to take action from the principle Settings interface:

1. Launch Settings.
2. Navigate to Apps > Put in apps > Microsoft OneDrive.
3. Faucet or click on on the ellipsis (three-dot) button, adopted by the Uninstall button (you could be required to kind in your PIN or password relying on administrator setup).

Lastly, you possibly can optionally purge the OneDrive folder from inside your PC’s file construction by navigating to File Explorer > Person folder (C:) > Customers > Your Identify > OneDrive, after which right-clicking or long-pressing on the folder and hitting the delete button from inside the context menu.