Remove Notifications Pane and 'Bell' Icon

Can I remove the notifications pane and its accompanying bell-shaped icon from the Taskbar? I have disabled all notifications, as well as 'do not disturb' and focus. If the Focus bar can also be removed, I'd like that too. I am aware of this group policy: User config > Admin templates > Start menu and taskbar > Remove notifications and action center; but when I enable this policy, the calendar also goes away. Thanks for your advice.

If you have 'StartAllBack' installed there is an ON/OFF toggle for the Notification Bell. It is on right-hand side of the 'Tray Icons' menu. It works on my machine.

It was discussed here. Looks like if you notification bell gone but still want calendar, you would have switch off action center and use 3rd party calendar.

Thanks for everyone's help. After further research I learned that the Taskbar calendar we all remember is now integrated with notifications and focus. This is a not-so-subtle example of Microsoft pushing users to work with its products whether you like it or not. There's no workaround, as others have discovered, so the only alternative is disable the action center from group policy and pin a third party calendar to the taskbar.

BulldogX said:

This is a not-so-subtle example of Microsoft pushing users to work with its products whether you like it or not.

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As @glasskuter said, you can install a 3rd party calendar. Microsoft isn’t pushing you to do anything, for as long as we can install software, we have a choice. Regardless, it’s their software so basically it’s their prerogative.

StartAllBack with W10 Calendar.

Edwin said:

StartAllBack with W10 Calendar.

View attachment 79839

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Perfect!