Remove "fun" facts from Spotlight lock screen in Windows 10 Home (1803)

UPDATE: I tried all solution proposed in How to disable “link your phone” links on the lock screen? and none of them seem to work on Windows 10 Home (version 1803), so this is probably not a duplicate question.

I like Spotlight on my lock screen, it keeps things fresh :). And with the 1803 update, I get new images more frequently, which is good. But with that same update some new "fun" facts were added, which mess up the picture.

Can I remove these facts ?

In the lock screen settings for Spotlight, there is no option to remove these:

I even switched to the lock screen picture settings to deactivate the setting, but that doesn't help either:

I already searched the internet, and some say to use the Group Policy settings, but they are not available on windows 10 Home edition.

Can this be done, or do I have to live with the "fun" facts ?

Update: I installed the Group Policy Editor and enabled the suggested option:

But I still have the facts displayed on my lock screen, even after a reboot.

Marc

Posted 2018-05-31T09:12:41.357

Reputation: 337

I would try to enable “get fun facts” then disable it, alongside a reboot – Ramhound – 2018-05-31T09:17:38.370

Possible duplicate of How to disable "link your phone" links on the lock screen?

– Ramhound – 2018-05-31T09:19:28.577

@Ramhound, tried rebooting, didn't help. The other question says what I tried. The disabling the "Get fun facts" setting does not help, and I don't have group policy in the Home edition. – Marc – 2018-05-31T09:22:09.463

You can add the group policy editor to Windows 10 Home. Does not chnage the fact, that option I suggested you toggle on and off, is suppose to enable or disable these hints. There isn’t any other option that is associated with those hints. – Ramhound – 2018-05-31T09:35:07.013

@Ramhound, I installed the Group Policy Editor, but it did not solve the problem. I edited my question to include this. – Marc – 2018-05-31T12:03:20.773

On my home computer Spotlight has always worked fine, and I'm OK with the "ads". On my work computer Spotlight never worked (yes, I checked GP thoroughly and it isn't blocked, it's working on many other computers in the office). I've tried many of the tricks to get it working over the months. However, a week ago I noticed it was working, probably after one of the recent Patch Tuesdays and it's cumulative patch. All that to say: Spotlight's implementation appears buggy to me and it wouldn't surprise me if some people experienced an issue like you note. – music2myear – 2018-05-31T15:25:13.723

That said: If the solution in the question linked does not work for you, then this is not a duplicate, but you should highlight in your question that the other solution doesn't work. Use more explicit language to make this clear: "As you can see, I have already tried the solutions offered in the linked question, and they do not work." Then provide any further troubleshooting/logs/relevant etc you can find. – music2myear – 2018-05-31T15:27:02.017

Question updated, indicating this is probably not a duplicate. – Marc – 2018-05-31T16:07:11.523

@music2myear The questions are identical. The fact there isn’t a working answer for Windows 10 Home is a different problem. But the duplicate question is identical to this question – Ramhound – 2018-05-31T16:30:15.470

Similar symptoms do not require the same cause. Different outcomes from the same process can indicate the root issue is different, and therefore the correct answer is different. Our goal in this case is either to confirm the issue is the same and hacking GP won't work in Home, or further explore and find the differences and the unique solution to this problem, with specific emphasis on improving the question throughout the process in order to clarify the differences. – music2myear – 2018-05-31T16:32:44.677

Do group policies even work on machines that are not on a domain/active directory and managed by a central admin? Hence the "group" in group policy, no? No sure they work for workgoups…? – Neville – 2018-06-14T09:02:55.570

Answers

It appears that at some point in the last year or two, the "Get fun facts" checkbox is no longer honored when you switch back to the Windows Spotlight option.

I have two Windows 10 machines, both build 1803. Both are set to use Windows Spotlight on the lock screen, but the older one does not show the tips and advertisements while the new one does. This was driving me crazy so I decided to dig into it, and I found this question while looking for an answer.

There are some non-GPO registry settings related to "subscribed content" in Windows 10 and one of these appears to control the lock screen tips. Under the key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ContentDeliveryManager

Set the DWORD value ContentDeliveryAllowed to 1.
Set the DWORD value RotatingLockScreenEnabled to 1.
Set the DWORD value RotatingLockScreenOverlayEnabled to 0.
Set the DWORD value SubscribedContent-338387Enabled to 0.

Why this works:

ContentDeliveryAllowed must be enabled for any of the dynamic content to work and should be enabled by default unless you've turned it off with policy. RotatingLockScreenEnabled enables the dynamic background picture instead of a static one. RotatingLockScreenOverlayEnabled is the "Get fun facts" option in the Settings app and setting it to 0 disables it.

Each of the SubscribedContent values appears to control a different part of the Windows UI, such as the start menu, taskbar, notifications area, etc., and 338387 seems to be the one for showing tips on the lock screen.

Nick

Posted 2018-05-31T09:12:41.357

Reputation: 491

I am on the other side. I have build 1803. Switch to lock screen to show picture and then few days later switch back to Windows Spotlight. The 'fun fact' is missing. I check the registry and both exist and both say 1. How do I get back the tips? – user3454439 – 2018-11-08T01:59:39.103

2I tested the registry settings provided by Nick. This is what I found: Setting SubscribedContent-338387Enabled to 0 changes the lock screen setting from Spotlight to Picture. The request was to have Spotlight enabled and just disable the fun facts. Therefore, this setting is of no value to resolve the issue. The setting RotatingLockScreenOverlayEnabled is not applicable to Spotlight. You get fun facts regardless of this setting's value. – Les Ferch – 2019-01-14T03:34:06.377

@LesFerch Sorry this didn't work for you. I've expanded the answer a little bit to include a couple of other fields which are necessary for the rotating picture to work which may have been disabled on your system. I know how aggravating this is, but what I've posted is still working for me. – Nick – 2019-01-14T17:23:20.823

you sir.... are a god. thank you so much for this. hey!! why is this only upvoted 3x – Saksham Goyal – 2019-01-28T01:40:12.157

1The value 338387 doesn't appear on my machine, but 338388 and 338389 do... – JS Lavertu – 2019-04-16T16:22:52.527

I had the exact same situation, added 338387 manually and still i can't get any tips or fun facts, i like to have those back in my Spotlight lock screen. anyone has any more suggestions? – d4v1dv00 – 2019-09-06T13:23:38.957

The only way that seems to consistently remove the ads but continue to rotate the spotlight pictures is to enable secure sign-in, which forces you to press ctrl+alt+del to get to the sign-in screen.

It is annoying to require extra keystrokes to sign-in, but it's worth it to get rid of the ads.

To enable secure sign-in, open the group policy editor via gpedit.msc, and look for:

Set its value to Disabled. Then reboot.

James L.

Posted 2018-05-31T09:12:41.357

Reputation: 322

I'm current with version 1909 (Enterprise) and this worked for me. – Nathan – 2020-02-13T16:22:56.687