Microsoft cloud-based services enable many helpful Microsoft 365 features. These "connected experiences" are described here.
Experiences that analyze your content
These analysis-focused experiences work with your Microsoft 365 content to provide design recommendations, editing suggestions, data insights, and similar features. Examples of this kind of experience include PowerPoint Designer, Dictate, and Translator.
For example, if you ask us to translate your text into another language, we submit it to our automated translator service which then returns to you the translated version.
Note: For a more complete list of these connected experiences, see Connected experiences in Microsoft 365.
Experiences that download online content
These experiences enable you to search and download online content including templates, images, 3D models, Microsoft 365 help, videos, and reference materials to enhance your documents. These experience types utilize Excel's rich data types and Outlook's weather info.
For example, to provide you with the weather forecast for the next couple of days, Outlook connects to Bing to retrieve the needed weather data.
Note: For a more complete list of these connected experiences, locate the applicable section within this page: Connected experiences in Microsoft 365.
Controlling these experiences
Microsoft 365 includes these connected experiences. You can turn these experiences off. Go to any Microsoft 365 application - such as Word, Excel, or PowerPoint - and go to File > Account > Manage Settings (In Outlook it's underFile > Office Account).
For more information see: Account Privacy Settings.
Note: If you're using Microsoft Copilot Pro, your privacy settings can affect the availability of Copilot features. For more information, see: Copilot Pro: Microsoft 365 apps and your privacy.
Another available setting allows you turn off these connected experiences; it will also turn off other connected experiences (e.g., document co-authoring and online file storage). If you use this setting to turn off connected experiences, some Microsoft 365 service functionality will still remain available. These include synching your mailbox in Outlook and a few services that are essential to how Microsoft 365 functions and cannot be disabled. One, for example, is the licensing service that confirms that you are properly licensed to use Microsoft 365. On the Mac, these essential services also include OneNote syncing to OneDrive. Required data about these services will still be collected and sent to Microsoft, regardless of any other settings that you have configured.
Note: For related information, see Required service data and Essential services.
