CoPilot for Microsoft 365

It is an AI chatbot assistant that brings generative AI into the Microsoft 365 apps like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Microsoft Teams, and Outlook – and combines it with the Microsoft Graph (where all your interactions and documents are stored). It’s an AI-powered tool that works as an additional productivity layer for all your applications.

Here are a few examples of what you can do with CoPilot for Microsoft 365:

• Generate a PowerPoint presentation from a Word document
• Obtain an instant and insightful analysis of your Excel data
• Request a summary of recent emails about a specific customer
• Create a first draft document in Word based on a prompt
• Quickly answer routine emails in Outlook
• Summarise unread emails from John
• Draft a message to my team with action items from my last meeting
• What’s our vacation policy?
• Who am I meeting with tomorrow?

This system combines three technologies:

• Microsoft 365 applications (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams, etc.)
• Microsoft Graph and all your organisation’s content and context in it
• The GPT-4 Large Language Model (LLM) that parses, understands, and creates human-readable text Like other AI chatbots like Bing and ChatGPT, you need to enter a prompt, and then it will automatically generate the document or a response depending on your instruction.

An administrator needs to assign the “Copilot for Microsoft 365” license to specific users or groups. Once assigned, this automatically enables its experiences to take place inside individual apps, such as Word, PowerPoint, Teams, Excel, Outlook, and more.

On January 15th, 2024, Microsoft announced that CoPilot for Microsoft 365 is now available for organisations of all sizes. This means that the previously introduced 300-seat minimum purchase for the commercial plans has been removed.

The requirements for using Microsoft Copilot for Microsoft 365 are nearly identical to the requirements for using Microsoft 365 Apps i.e., Outlook, Word, Excel, Teams, etc. It is an add-on plan with the following licensing prerequisites:

• Microsoft 365 Business Premium
• Microsoft 365 E3 · Microsoft 365 E5
• Microsoft 365 Business Standard
• Office 365 E3
• Office 365 E5
• Microsoft 365 A5 for faculty
• Microsoft 365 A3 for faculty
• Office 365 A5 for faculty
• Office 365 A3 for faculty

No, its add-on license is not technically “pay-as-you-go” in the same way as some cloud services with per-use billing. It requires a monthly subscription per user with an annual commitment.

It is designed to provide accurate and informative responses, based on the knowledge and your data available in the Microsoft Graph. However, answers may not always be accurate as they are generated based on patterns and probabilities in language data. Responses include references when possible, and it’s important to verify the information. While it has affordances to avoid sharing any offensive content or potentially harmful topics, you may still see unexpected results. We’re continuously working to improve our technology in preventing harmful content. If you find an answer is incorrect or if you encounter harmful or inappropriate content, please provide feedback by selecting the Thumbs Down icon and describing the issue in detail.

To ensure quality, CoPilot is given test questions, and its responses are evaluated based on criteria such as accuracy, relevance, tone, and intelligence. Those evaluation scores are then used to improve the model. It’s important to keep in mind that the system was designed to mimic natural human communication, but the output may be inaccurate, incorrect, or out of date. Providing feedback via the Thumbs Up and Thumbs Down icons will aid in teaching CoPilot which responses are and are not helpful to you as a user. We will use this feedback to improve it, just like we use customer feedback to improve other Microsoft 365 services and Microsoft 365 apps. We don’t use this feedback to train the foundation models used by CoPilot. Customers can manage feedback through admin controls. For more information, see Manage Microsoft feedback for your organisation.

No, you no longer need to link your personal account to your work account to use CoPilot. To use it in Bing for Business, sign into Microsoft Edge with your work account.

To use it in Bing for Business you need to be signed into Microsoft Edge with your Microsoft work account. To use Bing for Consumers, sign into Microsoft Edge with your personal Microsoft account. If you want to use both at the same time, you need to open Microsoft Edge in two separate windows, sign into one of them with your work account and sign into the other with your personal account.

It is built on Microsoft’s comprehensive approach to security, compliance, and privacy. For more information about privacy, see the following information: · If you’re using CoPilot for Microsoft 365 in your organisation (with your work or school account), see Data, Privacy, and Security for Microsoft Copilot for Microsoft 365. · If you’re using Copilot in Microsoft 365 apps at home as part of CoPilot Pro (with your personal Microsoft account), see CoPilot Pro: Microsoft 365 apps and your privacy.

As AI is poised to transform our lives, we must collectively define new rules, norms, and practices for the use and impact of this technology. Microsoft has been on a Responsible AI journey since 2017, when we defined our principles and approach to ensuring this technology is used in a way that is driven by ethical principles that put people first. Read more about Microsoft’s framework for building AI systems responsibly, the ethical principles that guide us, and the tooling and capabilities we’ve created to help customers use AI responsibly.

It presents only the data that each individual can access using the same underlying controls for data access used in other Microsoft 365 services. The permissions model within your Microsoft 365 tenant will help ensure that data will not leak between users and groups. For more information on how Microsoft protects your data, see Microsoft Privacy Statement.