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[All Hosts] (installation) Preview control of choice for COM or Office add-in #2291

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[All Hosts] (installation) Preview control of choice for COM or Office add-in #2291

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[All Hosts] (installation) Preview control of choice for COM or Offic…
Rick-Kirkham Jun 8, 2025
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clarifications
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Update docs/manifest/equivalentaddins.md
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40 changes: 39 additions & 1 deletion docs/manifest/equivalentaddins.md
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Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
---
title: EquivalentAddins element in the manifest file
description: Specifies backwards compatibility with an equivalent COM add-in, XLL, or both.
ms.date: 01/04/2022
ms.date: 06/12/2025
ms.localizationpriority: medium
---

Expand All @@ -20,6 +20,9 @@ Specifies backwards compatibility with an equivalent COM add-in, XLL, or both.

For more information, see [Version overrides in the add-in only manifest](/office/dev/add-ins/develop/xml-manifest-overview#version-overrides-in-the-manifest).

> [!NOTE]
> Some child elements are not valid in the Mail schemas. See [Can contain](#can-contain).

## Syntax

```XML
Expand All @@ -36,6 +39,41 @@ For more information, see [Version overrides in the add-in only manifest](/offic

- [EquivalentAddin](equivalentaddin.md)

## Can contain

The **\<EquivalentAddins\>** element can contain the following child element.

|Element|Content|Mail|TaskPane|
|:-----|:-----:|:-----:|:-----:|
|[Effect](#effect)|No|No|Yes|

### Effect

Specifies either that the COM add-in is disabled and hidden (instead of the Office Add-in) when they conflict, or specifies that the user chooses which to disable and hide. There are two possible values.

- **DisableWithNotification**: All of the COM add-ins specified in the child **\<EquivalentAddin\>** elements will be disabled and hidden. A popup dialog notifies the user that this happening.
- **UserOptionToDisable**: The user is prompted to choose whether to disable and hide COM add-ins specified in the child **\<EquivalentAddin\>** elements or to disable and hide the Office Add-in.
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@ElizabethSamuel-MSFT ElizabethSamuel-MSFT Jun 12, 2025 •
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I think the element name can be placed in backticks instead of bold - here and other instances

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I think the element name can be place in backticks instead of bold - here and other instances

This is the pattern we settled on a while back.

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True. We'll need to revise it since the updated guidance is to use backticks

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True. We'll need to revise it since the updated guidance is to use backticks

OK. That's out-of-scope for this PR. I'll create a backlog item.


> [!NOTE]
> If the **\<Effect\>** element is not present, the COM add-ins are enabled and the Office Add-in is disabled and hidden on the Windows computer.

The following is an example. The **\<Effect\>** element must be after all the **\<EquivalentAddin\>** elements.

```xml
<VersionOverrides>
...
<EquivalentAddins>
<EquivalentAddin>
<ProgId>ContosoCOMAddin</ProgId>
<Type>COM</Type>
</EquivalentAddin>
<Effect>UserOptionToDisable</Effect>
</EquivalentAddins>
</VersionOverrides>
```
> [!IMPORTANT]
> The **\<Effect\>** element is not available in Outlook.

## See also

- [Make your custom functions compatible with XLL user-defined functions](/office/dev/add-ins/excel/make-custom-functions-compatible-with-xll-udf)
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