Copilot License Cost 2026: Pricing and Credits Explained

Prices at a glance

The Copilot license remains the flat fee for everyday work: Copilot in Chat, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Teams, plus model choice. Cowork, Code, Autopilot, and the frontier models Fable and Astra are billed in Copilot Credits. In enterprise tenants, no credits are spent until an admin turns them on.

For everyday work, the most important part stays the same: Auto and model choice are part of the license. Microsoft has announced usage limits that most people should never reach. If you do hit one, you’re not stopped. You get a warning and can keep working with Auto at no extra cost, or with credits if your admin has turned them on.

That’s the gist of four posts Microsoft published on September 25, 2026. I checked them against the documentation on Microsoft Learn, and below I answer the four questions that come up first. All sources are listed at the end.

What did Microsoft announce on September 25, 2026?

The Copilot app gets three new areas:

• Home is the new start page. It brings Chat and Cowork together. Chat is for quick questions and drafts; Cowork is for tasks you hand off that run until the result is done. Word, Excel, and PowerPoint are built right in (“Office in Copilot”) and work on real files. Later, Copilot is supposed to decide on its own whether a request goes to Chat, Cowork, or Code.
• Code builds small apps from a description: desktop widgets, dashboards, and internal cloud apps you share with your team. It uses the same technology as GitHub Copilot and runs in a sandbox.
• Autopilot (formerly Scout) keeps working in the cloud, even when you’re not around. It has a name, a role, a goal, its own identity, its own memory, and its own workspace in your tenant. You @mention it in Teams and Outlook.

Apps built in Cowork, Code, and Copilot Studio run on Copilot Managed Runtime. Microsoft operates this environment inside your Microsoft 365 tenant, and IT manages it. Developer teams and third-party tools can deploy to it through an SDK and a command-line tool.

What does the license cover, and what are Copilot Credits for?

The Copilot license is the fixed per-user monthly price for everyday work: quick answers, first drafts, summaries, and analysis. Microsoft calls it the “user subscription license” (USL) and this kind of work “Everyday AI.” According to Microsoft, nothing you already get changes. Microsoft’s documentation now calls Microsoft 365 Copilot simply Microsoft Copilot.

Copilot Credits are the common currency Microsoft uses for usage-based billing (UBB). They pay for tasks you hand off, agents that run for hours, and unattended workflows, which Microsoft groups as “Advanced AI.” In Copilot, credits only come on top of the license, not instead of it. The exception is people who only use an app built in Cowork (see below).

Microsoft compares this to a plug-in hybrid. The license is the battery and covers most of the driving at a fixed price. Credits are the gas tank for longer trips.

There’s one exception on access. New Microsoft 365 Copilot Business licenses bought through a partner (CSP) from November 2, 2026, come with usage-based billing already turned on, according to Partner Center. Pay-as-you-go with a preset monthly limit is the default.

Both kinds of billing use models from several labs, currently OpenAI and Anthropic, with more labs and open-weight models to come. Microsoft also says some features will start on credits and move into the license once the economics allow, sometimes with a usage limit at first.

How much does a Copilot license cost, and what do credits cost?

In Microsoft’s own cost model, the license is $30. According to Microsoft’s Copilot Credits Guide, one Copilot Credit costs $0.01 with pay-as-you-go, so 100 credits are $1. For five long Cowork tasks, it adds about $39 to $43 in Copilot Credits depending on the model, calculated with Opus 5 or GPT-5.6 Sol at high reasoning effort. Microsoft doesn’t publish prices per task. It uses list prices without discounts and notes that real costs will vary. The same chart also runs the numbers for Claude and ChatGPT; that’s Microsoft’s own presentation.

What does Copilot Cowork cost?

Copilot Cowork is billed by usage in Copilot Credits, on top of the license: every task uses credits, and one credit costs $0.01 with pay-as-you-go. In Microsoft’s cost model, five long Cowork tasks add about $39 to $43 in credits depending on the model; Microsoft doesn’t publish a price per task. In enterprise tenants, no credits are spent until an admin turns them on through a spending policy. While a task is running, the /cost command in Cowork shows roughly how many credits it has used.

Can I keep using the model picker in Copilot?

Yes. Model choice is part of the license. Microsoft uses three tiers:

• Included with fair use, such as GPT-5.6 and Sonnet 5.
• Included with usage limits, such as Opus 5.
• Credits only, such as the frontier models Fable and Astra.

Auto stays the default. For each request, Auto picks the model and the reasoning effort based on accuracy, speed, and cost. Microsoft’s reasoning is what it calls saturation: for many tasks, a stronger model doesn’t produce a better result, for example when a meeting transcript is turned into bullet points.

According to Microsoft Learn, the usage limits are still “coming soon.” They’re meant to be set so that most people never hit them. For everyone else, Microsoft puts it this way:

“For the heaviest users, hitting a limit is not hitting a wall.” – Nicole Herskowitz, Microsoft

Here’s what happens when someone uses a model with a usage limit, such as Opus 5, a lot:

1. Copilot shows a notice shortly before the limit.
2. At the limit, nothing stops. You choose: keep going with Auto at no extra cost, or keep the model you picked and pay in credits.
3. Credits only work if your admin has set up a spending policy for them. Switching to credits is your choice, not something that happens automatically.

GPT-5.6 and Sonnet 5 aren’t in this group: Microsoft lists them as “included with fair use.” Microsoft hasn’t published how high the limits are or what period they cover, such as a month.

In the Cowork model picker, the frontier models are called GPT 6 Astra (OpenAI) and Claude Fable 5.1 (Anthropic), according to Microsoft Learn. Microsoft announced Astra on September 4, 2026, for Cowork and Copilot Studio only, both of which bill in credits.

Since September 22, 2026, GPT-6 Sol and Claude Opus 5.5 have been rolling out too, including in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Chat. Microsoft hasn’t assigned them to a tier yet; the September 25 posts still name GPT-5.6, Sonnet 5, and Opus 5. I’d put both in the same tier as Opus 5: included with usage limits. There are two reasons. Neither is on Microsoft’s list of credit models. And there’s currently no credit meter for model choice in Chat or the Office apps: cost management covers Cowork, apps built in Cowork, the Work IQ API, and now Code and Managed Runtime. As long as the usage limits aren’t active, Sol in Chat and Excel costs nothing extra.

In Cowork, on the other hand, every task costs credits, whatever the model. In one published hands-on test, a large Cowork task (a deck, a short brief, and an Excel matrix at high reasoning effort) used 699 credits with GPT-6 Sol, about $7. With Opus 5.5, it took 1,025 credits, about $10.

Admins will also be able to decide which model families each group can use. That’s coming to Cowork first, where it also limits which models Auto can pick from.

Can I use my existing Cowork budget?

Yes, and unless you change something, it also covers the new services. Cowork budgets live in spending policies under cost management in the Microsoft 365 admin center, which Microsoft calls cost management in Agent 365. Microsoft is expanding it: since September 25, 2026, it covers Code and Copilot Managed Runtime, and Copilot Studio agents from October 2026.

The setting to look at is Auto-apply new services. It’s on by default in every spending policy and adds newly supported services and agents to the policy automatically. According to Microsoft, a spending policy is both a budget and an access rule. So new services land in the same budget and open up to the same people. If you don’t want that, turn the setting off for each policy and add new services by hand.

Prepaid credits still work. A policy draws on capacity packs first, then credits from a pre-purchase plan, then pay-as-you-go through the linked Azure subscription. You share capacity packs with Copilot Studio: whatever is assigned to an environment in the Power Platform admin center isn’t available to Cowork.

For apps, building and running are billed separately. Building an app in Cowork runs through the builder’s Cowork policy. People who only use an app need their own coverage for running it: a spending policy for apps or a Power Apps Premium license. According to Microsoft, they don’t need a Copilot license to run an app built in Cowork.

New in cost management:

• Model families per group, starting with Cowork.
• Value, not just usage: the consumption dashboard in Insights shows which Cowork tasks use credits and what they produced.
• Usage for everyone: each person sees credits used, credits left, and their history right in Copilot.
• Credit request routing: requests for more credits go to your existing approval process through a URL you set.
• Policies via the Microsoft Graph API, for example from your own FinOps tools.

Model choice sits right in the spending policy. Adding a policy now includes a Model choice step, and only the models selected there consume credits under that policy.

Autopilot is billed by usage too. It doesn’t show up in cost management yet, since it’s only starting as a private preview.

What happens to the model picker in PowerPoint and Excel?

It stays in the license. According to Microsoft, Copilot in Word, Excel, and PowerPoint is part of the license, and so is model choice. Microsoft’s own cost model assumes Auto for the apps. So the apps work the same way as Chat: Auto by default, free choice among the included models, and usage limits with a warning.

The model picker in the apps offers models from OpenAI and Anthropic, in Word since August 2026, for example. Since September 22, GPT-6 Sol and Claude Opus 5.5 have been arriving in Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. By my reading above, they run on the license there. None of the posts say whether Fable and Astra will show up in the apps. If they do, they’d be billed in credits. How to pick the model yourself in PowerPoint is covered in Copilot in PowerPoint: 5 Tricks for Better, On-Brand Slides.

What decides the billing is how you work. If you revise slides in PowerPoint or have Excel suggest a chart, you stay within the license. If you hand a whole job to Cowork, you pay in credits. Microsoft’s examples include a launch kit and a financial close package.

Microsoft says Copilot will soon decide on its own whether a request goes to Chat or Cowork. At that point, you can no longer tell the billing from the mode you picked. The posts don’t describe how Copilot will show that credits are being used. In enterprise tenants, though, usage-based services stay off until an admin creates a spending policy.

Can I publish apps built in Code externally?

Not anonymously on the web. Microsoft describes Copilot Managed Runtime as an environment for internal line-of-business apps. Every app requires a Microsoft Entra sign-in and appears in the new Apps area of the Microsoft 365 admin center, where IT can block, delete, and monitor apps.

Inside your organization, you can share an app with individual people, with groups, or through a “People in your organization” link. Guests and other outside users can’t use that link. Guests with a guest account in your Entra ID only work if IT allows sharing with guests in the environment group’s rules. And everyone who uses the app needs the runtime coverage described above. During the preview, Microsoft blocks users without coverage after a warning, after 20 actions in the app or five minutes at most.

You can take the code with you, though. It lives in Git, in your own GitHub repository if you want, and developers can pull it down and keep building. Public GitHub repositories and packages built elsewhere are blocked in Managed Runtime by default. If you want to run an app for customers or the public, I think you’ll need your own platform. You’d lose the sign-in, policies, and inventory that Managed Runtime gives you.

My take

From what I’ve seen so far, the newest models in Copilot have been usable without usage limits. On the license, most recently, that’s GPT-6 Sol and Opus 5.5 in Chat and Excel; on credits, it’s Astra in Cowork. I fully expect new models to come to the license with fair-use limits and no extra charges. If you hit the limit, you keep working with Auto at no extra cost. Microsoft itself says features can move from credits into the license. It calls the license the foundation of Copilot and plans to keep building on it for everyday work.

For most people at work, the $30 license remains the best value. Credits make sense where you hand whole tasks to agents. Before you spend credits on a single agent idea, you can check for free whether it is feasible in Copilot Studio (in German).

Checklist for admins

1. Decide on Auto-apply new services for each policy. With it on, new services go into the same budget and to the same people, including Copilot Studio agents from October 2026. How this fits with the existing controls in the Power Platform admin center is covered in Copilot Studio Credits: Cost, Packs and Budget Explained.
2. Check access through your policies. Anyone in a policy that selects a service can use it, even with a tiny limit. If someone shouldn’t have access, keep them out of every such policy.
3. Set model families per group once the setting reaches your tenant. In Cowork, it also limits which models Auto can pick.
4. Decide what happens at the limit: a warning, a request, or no prompt at all. And decide where requests for more credits go, for example your IT portal.
5. Pick cost centers carefully. Policies can map to their own Azure subscriptions and resource groups. You can’t change a policy’s billing method later; you have to delete the policy and create a new one.
6. Open the Apps area in the admin center. Review the default rules for Managed Runtime, especially guest sharing and allowed connectors, and plan coverage for the people who’ll use apps.
7. Buying Copilot Business through a partner? For new licenses from November 2, 2026, pay-as-you-go is already on. Check the preset monthly limit before the first Cowork tasks run.
8. Explain Auto to your users. Auto costs nothing extra. Anyone who picks a fixed model can hit a limit and will get a warning first, not a bill. And the same model costs credits in Cowork but not in Chat.

Open questions

• How high the license’s usage limits are, what period they cover, and when they start.
• Whether Microsoft will explicitly put GPT-6 Sol and Claude Opus 5.5 in the tier with usage limits.
• What a task in Cowork, Code, or Autopilot costs. There’s Microsoft’s cost model, and in Cowork the /cost command shows roughly how many credits a running task has used. There’s no price list per task.
• How Copilot will show that a request it routed on its own is using credits.
• How Autopilot will be billed and shown in cost management.

If you want to set up spending policies, model access, and the new app management for your tenant, that’s what the coaching for IT and admins is for. What coaching costs is on the Copilot coaching pricing page.

Sources

• Microsoft: Introducing the new Copilot with Home, Code and Autopilot (Jared Spataro, September 25, 2026)
• Microsoft Copilot Blog: Build where you want, run with confidence: Now Microsoft hosts and manages the code created by Copilot (David Blyth, September 25, 2026)
• Microsoft Tech Community: Evolution of the Copilot pricing model (Nicole Herskowitz, September 25, 2026), New FinOps for AI capabilities (Ryan Jones, September 25, 2026), More Models, One Copilot (Xia Song, September 22, 2026), Available today: OpenAI GPT-6 Astra in Microsoft Copilot (Bas Brekelmans, September 4, 2026)
• Microsoft: Copilot Credits Guide (PDF, June 16, 2026)
• Microsoft Partner Center: September 2026 announcements
• Microsoft Learn: Understanding the user subscription license (USL) and usage-based billing (UBB), Understand usage-based billing and cost management for Copilot Credits, Managing AI experiences enabled by usage-based billing, Manage Copilot Cowork for your organization, Choose a model for Copilot Cowork, Microsoft 365 Copilot release notes, Application card: Microsoft Copilot (for organizations)
• Microsoft Learn, Copilot Managed Runtime: Overview for admins, FAQ, Default governance settings, Share an app, SDK overview
• Hands-on test: M365CopilotConnection, GPT-6 Sol vs Opus 5.5 vs Grok 4.5: I Tested the New Models in Microsoft 365 Copilot (September 23, 2026)

As of September 25, 2026. Limits, prices, and availability change quickly at Microsoft; Managed Runtime is a preview.