Redesigned Microsoft Copilot Will Build Apps and Work on Its Own
Micorosft has announced that it's redesigning Copilot, the company's all-encompassing AI assistant, so users can hand off complex tasks, build tools by describing what they need, and assign work to an agent that keeps going after they log off.
The new Copilot experience has three main parts: Home, Code, and Autopilot. It also brings Word, Excel, and PowerPoint into the Copilot app. For users, the pitch is simple: Start a task in one place and stay there as it grows from a quick question into a document, an app, or a longer-running project. Most of the new capabilities are still rolling out or in preview.
Home puts Chat and Copilot Cowork together. Chat remains the place for quick answers, research, and drafts. Cowork handles work a user wants to delegate, such as preparing a briefing or pulling together a response to a request for proposals. Microsoft said Copilot eventually will route requests to Chat, Cowork, or Code on its own.
Office in Copilot will allow users to create a Word document, Excel workbook, or PowerPoint deck without leaving that experience. The files remain editable in the regular Office apps, and colleagues can work on them at the same time. Someone building a presentation, for example, could draw on a workbook, draft the slides, and keep refining both files from within Copilot.
Code is aimed at people who need a tool but might never open a development environment. A user can describe a tracker, dashboard, app, or workflow in plain language and have Copilot build it. Microsoft calls these "small, purpose-built solutions." The feature uses the same underlying technology as GitHub Copilot and runs in a sandboxed environment. A separate Copilot Managed Runtime, now in preview, lets organizations host and share the resulting apps within Microsoft 365.
Then there is Autopilot, previously known as Scout. It is designed for work that does not end with a single response: following a discussion, checking in with stakeholders, or keeping a project moving over several days. "Give it a name, a role, and a goal," Microsoft said. Autopilot runs in the cloud and has its own identity, memory, and workspace in the customer's tenant. Microsoft said its actions are subject to permissions, auditing, and organizational controls.
Those longer-running tasks also change how customers pay for Copilot. In a separate pricing post, Microsoft said everyday work in Chat and Microsoft 365 apps will remain covered by a per-user subscription. Cowork, Code, and Autopilot will be billed separately through usage-based Copilot Credits. A Copilot user subscription will still be needed to access those features.
For enterprise customers, the features that charge by usage will stay off until an admin sets up a spending policy in the Microsoft 365 admin center. Microsoft said there will be no charges before then. Admins can set budgets for the whole organization or for specific groups, limit how much individual users can spend, and get alerts when costs approach a set amount. Reports will show who is using the features and which tasks are driving costs.
Microsoft is bringing Code and Copilot Managed Runtime under those cost controls alongside Cowork. Copilot Studio agents are expected to follow in October. Before turning the features on for more employees, IT departments will need to decide who can use them, how much they can spend and which tasks are worth the extra cost.
Home and Code will begin rolling out through Microsoft's Frontier early access program in the coming weeks. Code's Frontier rollout starts at the end of September, when Autopilot also expands to private preview.
For more information, visit the Microsoft site.