Microsoft 365 Copilot

What is Microsoft 365 Copilot?

Microsoft reported more than 30 million paid Copilot seats on its July 2026 earnings call, so this is often the AI layer your employer picks for you rather than one you choose. Its edge is grounding: answers draw on your own mail, files, chats and meetings, across Word, Outlook, Teams and PowerPoint. Spreadsheet work is covered in our separate Excel Copilot entry, same license. It only pays off inside an existing Microsoft 365 tenant, so check whether your admin has assigned you a license before planning around it.

Three things Microsoft 365 Copilot does best

1. Answers using your own company files

   Copilot draws on the mail, documents, chats and meetings you already have permission to see, so it can answer questions like who owns a project or what changed in a contract. Microsoft calls this layer Work IQ. Permissions are inherited, so it never surfaces files you cannot open.

2. Works inside the apps you already use

   Rather than a separate chat window, Copilot sits inside Word, Outlook, PowerPoint and Teams: drafting from an existing document, rewriting or shortening mail threads, building a first-draft deck from a file, and recapping a meeting you missed with attributed notes and suggested action items.

3. Research and analysis agents, plus your own

   A license includes Researcher, which pulls together multi-step reports from work data and the web, and Analyst, which reasons over spreadsheets and data. Teams can also build task-specific agents in Copilot Studio, though publishing them usually needs admin approval and can carry separate usage charges.

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