Windows 10 comes with new Phone-PC linking feature also known as "Your Phone" feature which allows users to link or connect their Android mobile phones and Apple iPhones with their Windows 10 device. After linking, they can text, email and see photos from their phones, right on their Windows 10 PC. They can also send webpages from their phones to their Windows 10 devices.
This Phone-PC linking or Your Phone feature can be accessed and used using 2 ways:
- Using Windows 10 Settings app
- Using Your Phone app
Windows 10 users can open Settings app from Start Menu or by pressing WIN+I keys together and go to Phone section to add and link their mobile phone as shown in following screenshot:
Users can also launch Your Phone app from Start Menu's all programs list and then link their mobile phone with their Windows 10 device using the setup wizard. Following screenshot shows Your Phone app running in Windows 10:
Sometimes you may need to restrict or prevent Phone-PC linking feature. For example, you are a system administrator and want to restrict users from accessing this feature. Or you have a Windows 10 PC but want to disallow other family members, etc from linking their mobile phone with your Windows 10 PC for security reasons.
In such situations, you can disable Phone-PC linking or Your Phone feature in Windows 10 using Group Policy or Registry Editor.
Once you disable Your Phone feature in Windows 10 and someone tries to access this feature, he'll receive following error messages or warnings:
Message while accessing Phone-PC linking feature in Windows 10 Settings app:
Some of these settings are hidden or managed by your organization.
Similarly, if a user tries to launch Your Phone app from Start Menu to link his smartphone with Windows 10 device, he'll get following warning message displayed inside the app:
This app has been blocked by your system administrator
Contact your system administrator for more info.
So people will be unable to link their mobile phones with Windows 10 computers once you disable Phone-PC linking feature.
If you also want to disable and restrict Phone-PC linking or Your Phone feature in Windows 10, following methods will help you:
METHOD 1: Using Group Policy Editor (gpedit.msc)
1. Press WIN+R keys together to launch RUN dialog box. Now type gpedit.msc and press Enter. It'll open Group Policy Editor.
2. Now go to:
Computer Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> System -> Group Policy
3. In right-side pane, look for following option:
Phone-PC linking on this device
The option is set to Not Configured by default. Double-click on the option and set it to Disabled.
Click on Apply button and then OK button to exit.
That's it. It'll immediately disable Phone-PC linking functionality in your Windows 10 device.
PS: If you want to restore the Phone-PC linking feature in future, simply set the option in Group Policy Editor to "Not Configured" again.
METHOD 2: Using Registry Editor (regedit.exe)
If you are using Home edition of Windows, you'll not be able to run gpedit.msc command because this edition doesn't come with Group Policy Editor.
If you can't use or don't want to use Group Policy Editor, you can take help of Registry Editor for the same task. Just follow these simple steps:
1. Press WIN+R keys together to launch RUN dialog box. Now type regedit and press Enter. It'll open Registry Editor.
2. Now go to following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\
3. Create a new key under Windows key and set its name as System
4. Select System key and in right-side pane, create a new DWORD EnableMmx and set its value to 0
Close Registry Editor. You may need to restart your computer to take effect.
Now Phone-PC linking feature will be completely disabled in your Windows 10 device.
PS: In future if you want to restore the feature, simply delete the DWORD created in above steps.
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