Microsoft Copilot Cheat Sheet: Advantages, Worth and Variations

Microsoft Copilot, with its integration into Home windows, Bing, 365, Azure, and Server, is presupposed to be the AI that unlocks the inventive and productive potential of a corporation’s folks and information.

What’s Microsoft Copilot?

Microsoft Copilot is an AI product that mixes the ability of enormous language fashions with in-house enterprise information generated by the Microsoft Graph and Microsoft 365 purposes. Utilizing the ability of AI and pure language conversations, customers can discover higher solutions to their questions and probably create content material from these solutions. Copilot was developed on the ChatGPT platform and introduced as an in-development platform on the July 2023 Microsoft Encourage convention.

There are three variations of Copilot:

Copilot for Microsoft 365 (previously often known as Microsoft 365 Copilot), which requires a subscription,
Copilot Professional, one other subscription model which gives precedence entry GPT-4 and GPT-4 Turbo throughout instances of excessive site visitors

and a extra common, free Microsoft Copilot.

It is very important notice that Copilot for Microsoft 365 is totally different from the patron and small business-oriented Copilot platform present in Bing Chat or non-enterprise variations of Microsoft 365. These Copilot LLMs are educated on extra generalized combination information gathered throughout the web and subsequently are inclined to have extra generalized outcomes. Copilot for Microsoft 365 relies on the info generated by a selected, and solely a selected, enterprise.

Each Copilot variations are embedded within the Microsoft 365 apps together with Phrase, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and Groups. This whole Microsoft 365 integration permits a corporation’s employees to be extra inventive, unlock productiveness features and probably enhance their expertise. As well as, Microsoft 365 Copilot provides AI-enabled Microsoft 365 Chat (previously referred to as Enterprise Chat) to the productiveness suite, which works throughout enterprise-specific information like calendars, emails, chats, paperwork, conferences and contacts to assist workers talk simpler and higher.

As of Dec. 5, Copilot ran on OpenAI’s GPT-4 massive language mannequin and the DALL-E 3 picture technology mannequin from the identical firm. On March 12, Microsoft CEO of Promoting and Internet Companies Mikhail Parakhin introduced that the Copilot free tier now defaults to GPT-4 Turbo. (Copilot Professional customers have the choice to change again to GPT-4.)

As of March 21, Copilot for Microsoft 365 is out there in Home windows through the “Work” toggle (versus the “Internet” toggle for the general public Copilot utilizing usually accessible information). Microsoft additionally introduced two new Floor for Enterprise gadgets meant to be used with Copilot, the Floor Professional 10 and Floor Laptop computer 6, each of which got here out on April 9. These and the brand new Floor Professional Keyboard have a devoted Copilot key.

On Could 20, Microsoft revealed new AI PCs constructed round Copilot in a prebriefing for the Construct convention. The Copilot+ laptops, accessible sooner or later from Microsoft, Dell, Lenovo, Acer, HP and Asus, will be capable to run the AI domestically.

What are the variations of Microsoft Copilot?

As of Nov. 15, 2023, Microsoft consolidated three variations of Microsoft Copilot (Microsoft Copilot in Home windows, Bing Chat Enterprise and Microsoft 365 Copilot) into two: Microsoft Copilot and Copilot for Microsoft 365. In January 2024, Microsoft added another choice: Copilot Professional.

Microsoft Copilot

Microsoft Copilot incorporates the instruments previously often known as Bing Chat and Bing Chat Enterprise. It’s appropriate for particular person or SMB customers. Microsoft Copilot has a seamless visible id throughout Bing, Edge, Microsoft 365, and Home windows, being accessible by means of the identical icon in all of them. This model of Copilot means that you can use generative AI to create and full duties contained in the Home windows working system and with Home windows apps. Copilot is out there from the taskbar or with the Home windows Key + C keyboard shortcut.

Industrial information safety is utilized to any interplay with Microsoft Copilot when the person indicators in with Microsoft Entra ID.

The next licenses achieve entry to industrial information safety with Microsoft Copilot:

Microsoft 365 E3, E5
Microsoft 365 F3 (coming quickly)

Microsoft 365 A3, A5 (School solely)
Enterprise Customary
Enterprise Premium

Copilot for Microsoft 365

Copilot for Microsoft 365 builds on the Bing Chat Enterprise basis, together with enterprise-grade safety, privateness and compliance to make sure all information processing occurs inside Microsoft 365. It’s appropriate for enterprise clients. The Copilot for Microsoft 365 expertise consists of Microsoft 365 Chat, which combs throughout your whole universe of information (emails, conferences, chats, paperwork and extra, plus the web) that can assist you resolve issues at work. Copilot for Microsoft 365 with Microsoft 365 Enterprise Customary or Microsoft 365 Enterprise Premium prices $30 per person per 30 days.

Copilot for Microsoft 365 can be built-in into Microsoft 365 Apps like Phrase, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Groups and extra.

In January 2024, Microsoft eliminated the seat minimal (300 seats) for Copilot for Microsoft 365, providing it at $30 per person per 30 days for between one and 299 seats. This expands the product’s industrial plan to small and medium-sized companies.

Copilot Professional

Copilot Professional is a subscription service for people costing $20 per 30 days per person. Meant for tremendous customers, it provides Picture Creator from Designer (previously Bing Picture Creator). With Copilot Professional accessible by means of Copilot in Phrase, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and OneNote on PC, Mac and iPad for Microsoft 365 Private and Household subscribers, Copilot Professional brings information from totally different purposes collectively to permit the AI assistant to work with extra context-relevant info. Copilot Professional may even present entry to Microsoft’s upcoming Copilot GPT Builder. Copilot Professional prices $20 per person per 30 days.

SEE: Microsoft Copilot: Decide Which Model is Proper for You

When will Microsoft Copilot be accessible?

As of December 2023, Copilot for Microsoft 365, Microsoft Copilot and Copilot Professional are usually accessible.

How a lot does Microsoft Copilot value?

Microsoft Copilot in Home windows will likely be accessible to clients totally free.
Copilot Professional prices $20 per person per 30 days.
Copilot for Microsoft 365 prices $30 per person per 30 days.

At first look, Microsoft 365 Copilot’s value level appears costly, however it’s important to recollect this model of the platform is designed for big enterprise enterprises. For a big enterprise with hundreds of workers, and assuming the platform delivers what Microsoft guarantees, that $30 might find yourself being a cut price. That may be a huge assumption to make at this early level in growth.

The patron and SMB variations of Microsoft Copilot will probably be priced otherwise than the enterprise counterpart. Bing Chat, which can be primarily based on ChatGPT, is out there now and totally free as an integral a part of Microsoft Edge. Additionally it is probably that some feature-restricted or in any other case modified model of Copilot will likely be accessible for SMBs too small to have significant in-house generated information accessible to coach the AI platform.

The pricing for all of the variations of Microsoft Copilot is more likely to change as growth of the platform continues. With the massive variety of rivals within the AI platform area, it appears virtually sure the price of these companies will change considerably.

Copilot in Home windows 11

In January, Microsoft introduced new Home windows 11 PCs (together with the Floor line) popping out in late February by means of Spring 2024 will embody a Copilot key. The Copilot key allows quick access to Copilot in Home windows.

Home windows 11 brings all kinds of capabilities for Copilot, together with however not restricted to:

Displaying system, machine and battery info

Launching narration or the Voice Entry web page
Displaying accessible Wi-Fi networks
Connecting to third-party apps like OpenTable for enterprise lunch reservations.

The Floor Professional 11 and Floor Laptop computer 7 will be capable to run AI options on-device.

What are enterprise advantages to utilizing Microsoft Copilot?

Assuming Microsoft Copilot works as marketed, an worker might jump-start a mission (e.g., electronic mail, presentation, report, information visualization) with an AI-generated first draft. With that basis, the worker can shortly transfer on to refining and iterating a second draft after which a closing draft, reducing no less than one step from the method. This may make the worker extra environment friendly and productive, and it might permit for the event of latest expertise.

For Copilot for Microsoft 365, the important thing to those productiveness features is the appliance of enterprise-specific information to the brand new mission from the beginning. Utilizing information internally generated by the enterprise from emails, paperwork, calendars, contacts and so forth, presumably the mission will likely be jump-started with restricted, and extra importantly, pertinent belongings.

SEE: Hiring equipment: Immediate engineer (TechRepublic Premium)

For instance, if an enterprise worker at Ford is making a presentation that should present motion, the AI – if correctly educated – ought to use a Ford-related product somewhat than an analogous product from certainly one of its rivals. An AI educated by information culled from the web could come to a distinct conclusion and defeat the aim of deploying enterprise-specific generative AI.

How does Microsoft plan to combine Copilot into its purposes?

Copilot is built-in into the material of all Microsoft 365 purposes. When an worker begins a Phrase doc, reads an electronic mail in Outlook, opens an Excel report or updates a PowerPoint presentation, Copilot and its generative AI skills are there to help when referred to as upon. In January 2024, Microsoft added Copilot capabilities to the Microsoft 365 cellular app and launched a Copilot cellular app. In February 2024, Microsoft redesigned the Copilot homepage and app.

Beneath are examples of instructions a person would possibly give Microsoft Copilot.

Copilot in Phrase

Draft a two-page mission proposal primarily based on information gleaned from a Phrase doc (i.e., both the one you might be at present engaged on or one that you simply specify by title) and an Excel worksheet.
Make the third paragraph within the present doc extra concise and alter the tone of the doc to be extra informal.

Create a one-page draft primarily based on this tough define.

Copilot in Excel

Break down this gross sales information by sort and channel after which insert a desk.
Undertaking the impression of a variable change on this information after which generate a chart to assist visualize it.

Mannequin how a change to the expansion price for a variable would impression my gross margin.

Copilot in PowerPoint

Create a five-slide presentation primarily based on this Phrase doc and embody related inventory photographs.
Consolidate this presentation right into a three-slide abstract.

Reformat these three bullets (in a selected PowerPoint presentation) into three columns, every with an image.

Copilot in Outlook

Summarize the emails missed whereas out of the workplace final week and flag any essential objects.
Draft a response thanking the senders of an electronic mail and asking for extra particulars about their second and third factors.

Shorten a draft electronic mail and make the tone extra skilled.
Invite everybody to a lunch-and-learn about new product launches subsequent Thursday at midday. Point out that lunch is supplied.

Copilot in Microsoft 365 Chat

Summarize the chats, emails and paperwork concerning the matter being mentioned.

What’s the subsequent milestone for a mission? What dangers had been recognized? Brainstorm an inventory of potential mitigations.
Write a brand new planning overview within the model of this (specified present) doc that accommodates the planning timeline from a distinct doc and incorporate the mission checklist within the electronic mail from this individual (specifying a person’s title).

Copilot GPTs

Use (specified present) pure language prompts to construct personal customized generative AI assistants.

Designer for Copilot:

Create photos primarily based on prompts.
Edit generated photos.
Coming quickly, entry Designer GPT, an assistant for brainstorming with Designer for Copilot.

Copilot for Finance, Gross sales and Service

On Feb. 29 Microsoft introduced Copilot for Finance, Gross sales and Service. Copilot for Finance can create reconciliation summaries to shortly establish lacking transactions or invoices, entry buyer and ERP information instantly in Microsoft Outlook, draft emails to clients, analyze variances and higher perceive root causes. Copilot for Finance is in public preview.

Copilot for Gross sales can synch with Outlook and CRM platforms to research buyer and alternative information. Copilot for Service can connect with Salesforce, ServiceNow and Zendesk. It may be used to browse and replace CRM information in Outlook, then add contacts on to a CRM. It will probably additionally assist create and deploy customized copilots (smaller chatbots) to brokers. Copilot for Gross sales and Service are usually accessible.

Copilot for Safety

Copilot for Safety is a safety dashboard and a generative AI chatbot which integrates with Microsoft’s different cybersecurity merchandise and platforms. Copilot for Safety will likely be usually accessible April 1 for a consumption-based price.

What are potential issues and caveats with Microsoft Copilot?

All AI platforms are solely nearly as good as their coaching; if Microsoft Copilot is modeled after information that’s incomplete, biased, mistaken or in any other case corrupt, the ideas it generates, no matter who’s asking, will likely be incomplete, biased, mistaken or in any other case corrupt. The outdated adage of rubbish in equals rubbish out nonetheless applies.

For Copilot for Microsoft 365, coaching is especially essential as a result of all the info used for that Copilot AI platform will likely be internally generated and gathered. Enterprises trying to correctly apply AI should rigorously monitor the info Copilot can entry. For instance, a enterprise could not need brainstorming paperwork and assembly notes to be a part of the info stream; rejected concepts could taint the info stream and propagate all through the group.

Storing this huge quantity of information can nonetheless be a privateness drawback when the info is saved on-device. Copilot+ laptops provide the Recall function, a timeline of snapshots the AI can scan to reply questions in pure language concerning the person’s historical past and exercise. Recall might be helpful when you’re positive you made a chart however can’t bear in mind which utility you made it in, for instance. However the U.Ok.’s Info Commissioner Workplace is “making enquiries with Microsoft to grasp the safeguards in place to guard person privateness.”

For common variations of Microsoft Copilot, organizations and customers ought to conscious that inherent biases, fads, misguided traits and different transitory occasions will probably colour among the AI-generated output. Not each passing fancy on the web ought to make its method into official organizational paperwork.

Along with this potential drawback, particularly for Copilot for Microsoft 365 implementations, is the tendency of some departments to silo their information behind firewalls. New services developed below non-disclosure agreements, for instance, will typically be reduce off from the conventional organizational information stream. Companies should determine whether or not hiding information from the AI in such instances is extra useful than permitting AI entry.

What are the alternate options to Microsoft Copilot?

Generative AI is arguably the most popular development in expertise innovation for 2023 and early 2024, so it stands to purpose there are lots of new and in-development AI platforms able to compete with Microsoft Copilot.

Though Copilot is predicated on ChatGPT, the AI chatbot is out there as a standalone platform and subsequently needs to be thought of a competitor. Generative AI is already included into Microsoft Edge within the type of Bing Chat, and a generative AI has lately been launched for the Google search engine and Chrome. Plainly generative AI will likely be built-in into nearly each digital utility we use on a computing machine.

Main tech firms together with Salesforce, Oracle and Adobe are all engaged on AI platforms. There are additionally dozens of smaller impartial builders engaged on their very own variations of an AI platform. Plus, there are a mess of AI rivals engaged on specialised platforms that can bind LLMs and generative AI rules to particular purposes. Companies will probably spend a variety of time wading by means of AI platform prospects.

Which companies ought to think about Microsoft Copilot, and which mustn’t?

At $30 per person per 30 days, enterprise leaders might want to decide whether or not Copilot for Microsoft 365 is true for his or her enterprise dimension, wants and price range. Along with the subscription price, such employers may even need to account for the additional bills related to producing, gathering and collating correct and helpful information for the AI and LLMs to coach on. This can be a main enterprise, and the choice to implement the Copilot platform will take a major dedication.

Giant enterprises should determine whether or not the productiveness advantages of utilizing the Copilot for Microsoft 365 platform outweigh the preliminary prices of growing and sustaining the platform – after which paying for it indefinitely.

For people and small companies with little to no LLM-ready information, the patron stage variations of Microsoft Copilot is out there totally free. Bing Chat is already accessible in Microsoft Edge for everybody.

Solely time will inform if the generative AI capabilities of Copilot are well worth the time obligatory to make use of them.

Microsoft Copilot Cheat Sheet: Advantages, Worth and Variations

What’s Microsoft Copilot?