If you run a recent version of Windows 11 on your PC you may have noticed — or not — that Microsoft installed a new application automatically on the device. Called OneDrive Photos, it brings OneDrive’s gallery view to the operating system. To make things worse, reports suggest that Microsoft is pushing the app to non-managed and managed devices.
As always, Microsoft has not confirmed any of that at the time. However, there are multiple reports on sites like Reddit that confirm the installation of the app on devices. Some Windows administrators have created scripts that remove the app from devices, which shows up as Beta for some.
To make matters even worse, it seems that the app installs itself again after it has been removed. Windows Latest suggests that it is linked to the synchronization of OneDrive, but this has not been confirmed yet.
You can check in Settings > Apps whether the extra OneDrive app is installed, or use other means, such as winget to find out. You could also check the following two locations for the actual app that Microsoft pushed to the system:
- %userprofile%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\OneDrive\OneDrive.App.exe
- C:\Program Files\Microsoft OneDrive\OneDrive.App.exe
So what can you do about it? If you do not use OneDrive, you could remove the app entirely and be done with it. If you do, you might be able to replace it with a dummy file in the directory and write protect it. I did not test this, as I’m still running Windows 10 on my main PC.
Just when you thought that Microsoft might have finally understood what users want, it is falling back to old habits. Seems the company never really learns.