Vole warned that it was going to pull the plug on the assistant later in August, and already reports have come in of that happening.

The assistant is no longer available if you try to access it in Windows 11. Along with that notification, a link is provided to a support page where you can learn more about what’s going on.

Cortana will be removed from Microsoft Teams later this year and will only remain in Outlook mobile by the time the end of 2023.

Most people will not notice Cortana gone as it was not really used that much. Microsoft wants to replace it with Windows Copilot AI, a much more ambitious desktop assistant.

This will basically be the Bing AI integrated into a side panel in Windows 11, but with a lot of extra abilities to customise Windows settings in various ways, to save you the trouble of having to hunt for them.

Microsoft’s Copilot is already in test builds of Windows 11. Rumour has it Copilot could debut in Windows 11 23H2 although that would be a little tight.