MC806103Microsoft SharePoint: “Remove-SPOExternalUser” retires starting July 29, 2024

Updated July 5, 2024: We have updated the content below with additional information. Thank you for your patience.

Starting July 29, 2024, and ending August 9, 2024, we will be retiring the Remove-SPOExternalUser PowerShell cmdlet for Microsoft SharePoint Online (SPO) users as part of our ongoing efforts to enhance security and streamline scope and permissions for external users.

After the retirement, requests using the Remove-SPOExternalUser cmdlet will be blocked with an error message similar to:

“To streamline scope and permissions for external users, enhance access management, and strengthen our security posture, this cmdlet has been deprecated. Alternatively, please use the Remove-MgUser cmdlet in Microsoft Graph PowerShell for user management. Learn more: Remove-MgUser (Microsoft.Graph.Users) | Microsoft Learn."

How this will affect your organization:

Our telemetry indicates that only a few organizations are active users of the Remove-SPOExternalUser cmdlet for their user management needs. If this change impacts your org, please note that the functionality will continue to be available through alternate means for the tenant admins/users (see below for details).

What you need to do to prepare:

Please begin immediately transitioning from using the Remove-SPOExternalUser cmdlet. To avoid unexpected impact, also ensure none of your workflows are calling this cmdlet. Instead, please use the Remove-MgUser cmdlet as described in Remove-MgUser (Microsoft.Graph.Users) | Microsoft Learn, where we will continue to invest resources. 

Additional Information:

• Troubleshoot user profile removal issues in SharePoint - SharePoint in Microsoft 365 | Microsoft Learn (this resource currently undergoing updates).