What is Copilot?
Quick answer
Copilot is Microsoft’s AI assistant. You can chat with it to answer questions, write and summarize text, and create images. It’s built into Windows, the Edge browser, Bing and Microsoft 365 apps like Word, Excel and Outlook. GitHub Copilot is a related tool that helps programmers write code.
“Copilot” is Microsoft’s name for a whole family of AI assistants. They share the same idea, an assistant that works alongside you, but they live in different places.
The main versions
| Version | Where you find it | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Microsoft Copilot | Windows, Edge, the Copilot app, copilot.microsoft.com | General chat, answers, writing and image creation |
| Microsoft 365 Copilot | Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams | Drafts documents, analyzes spreadsheets, summarizes emails and meetings |
| GitHub Copilot | Code editors and GitHub | Suggests and writes code |
| Copilot+ PCs | Laptops with a built-in AI chip | Run some AI features directly on the device |
What you can use it for
- Asking questions and getting answers with links to sources
- Writing or rewriting emails, posts and essays
- Summarizing long documents or web pages
- Building formulas or charts in Excel
- Creating images from a text description
Is Copilot free?
The basic Microsoft Copilot chat is free with a Microsoft account. Copilot features inside Microsoft 365 apps and GitHub Copilot come with paid plans, though some include free tiers or trials. Plans and prices change often, so check Microsoft’s site for the current details.
How it works
Copilot is powered by large language models, AI systems trained on huge amounts of text to predict and generate language. Like all such tools, it can make mistakes, so double-check facts and figures before relying on them. For the bigger picture, see what AI is.
If you use Copilot on Windows, you might also want to know how to get help in Windows or change your Microsoft account password.
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