Every time I talk about Copilot, its value, its impact, the way it can improve a developer workflow, someone jumps in with the complaint: “Just let me switch it off.” As if they’re somehow locked into a tool they didn’t choose. Let’s be clear. You’ve always had the option to disable it. You can remove it entirely. And now, you can fine-tune exactly how and when it shows up.
So this is the post I’ll point to every time someone insists they’re stuck with Copilot. If you genuinely can’t use the tool or simply don’t want to, here’s how to turn it off
Switch off Copilot in Visual Studio:
Launch the Visual Studio Installer by selecting Tools > Get Tools and Features from the Visual Studio menu.
In the Visual Studio Installer, select the Individual components tab. In the search box, type "copilot" to locate the GitHub Copilot component.
Uncheck GitHub Copilot, GitHub Copilot Chat, GitHub Copilot Completions to remove it from your VS installation.
Click the Modify button to apply the changes. This will uninstall GitHub Copilot from your Visual Studio instance.
Restart Visual Studio
That’s it, really simple.
Reducing Interruptions from Copilot
Maybe you do not need to switch off Copilot, you just might prefer a quieter workspace while deep in thought. Then Visual Studio offers streamlined options to help you stay immersed in your code and get the level of assistance that matches your style or task. Your options include:
- No completions while typing.
- Only receive code completions when you request it.
- Hide next edit suggestions and only preview when you are ready.
For more details on how to control Copilot please check out this post, Better Control over Your Copilot Code Suggestions.
Ok, now let me get this off my chest…
There is a kind of knee-jerk rejection that shows up whenever I suggest AI tools, not specifically Copilot, might be remotely helpful to some segments of the developer population. There is a very vocal minority that can see no inherent value in AI for anything. Some people treat my reaction to AI the way I treat excitement around crypto. With skepticism and doubt. Meanwhile I see thousands of developers using AI daily and getting valuable stuff done.
Now, I do think it is important to recognize concerns about the environmental impact of LLMs, I also support promoting and supporting ethically sourced datasets with fair compensation for authors and artists. However, most of the critiques I receive fail to reflect our current reality. AI brings real utility and continues to reshape developer tools, but criticism often reduces anyone who sees even a glimpse of value to a corporate shill.
Despite all this, developers continue to adopt Copilot (and other AI tools) at an extraordinary pace. That said, if AI features aren’t serving your workflow you should absolutely have the freedom to turn them off. But if you dismiss this all as hype or just a passing trend, you might be overlooking what’s actually driving this shift.
Anyway this is my “taps the sign” blog post on this topic.
