Enable Customer Experience Improvement Program
This per-user registry value controls whether Office 2016 users can participate in the Microsoft Office Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP).
since 0.9.8.11
Purpose
Show registry keys (1)
HKCU\software\policies\microsoft\office\16.0\common\qmenable
This per-user registry value controls whether Office 2016 users can participate in the Microsoft Office Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP). When a user participates, Office applications automatically send information about application usage to Microsoft. Microsoft combines this information with other CEIP data to investigate problems and improve commonly used products and features.
qmenable is a REG_DWORD value. A value of 1 represents the enabled policy state: users are offered the opportunity to opt in when they first run an Office application. It does not, by itself, force enrollment. A value of 0 represents the disabled policy state and prevents users from participating in CEIP. According to the Office administrative template, leaving the policy unconfigured produces behavior equivalent to the enabled state.
Notes
Security
Participation causes Office usage information to be transmitted to Microsoft. The Office 2016 administrative template states that CEIP does not collect users’ names or addresses, although Microsoft receives the IP address used to transmit the data. Participation can therefore be relevant in environments whose privacy or security requirements restrict the transfer of usage data to external services.
Preventing CEIP participation does not stop every form of data transmission by Office. In newer Microsoft 365 Apps, diagnostic data, connected experiences, and required service data are governed by separate privacy policies.
Notes
The setting is part of the Office administrative templates that use the 16.0 version identifier. Microsoft 365 Apps and later Office products also use this identifier, but this particular policy describes the legacy Office Customer Experience Improvement Program. For Microsoft 365 Apps Version 1904 and later, Microsoft documents separate policies for diagnostic data and connected experiences.
Support for Office 2016 ended on October 14, 2025. The setting may remain present in the Office administrative templates, but its presence does not imply continued support for Office 2016.
Microsoft documentation
Microsoft Download Center: Administrative Template files (ADMX/ADML) for Microsoft Office
Microsoft Learn: Plan an upgrade from older versions of Office to Microsoft 365 Apps