Microsoft Copilot in 2026: Free App, Paid Plans and What's New

Microsoft Copilot is Microsoft’s AI assistant: a free chat app for iPhone, Android, Windows and the web, plus deeper features inside Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and OneDrive if you pay for a Microsoft 365 plan. If you just saw it climb the App Store charts, the free app is the place to start. Read on if you want to know what you’d get by paying, and what Microsoft’s big September 2026 revamp changes.

Everything below reflects what we could confirm as of October 2026. Microsoft changes Copilot’s plans and features often, so check the official pages before you buy anything.

Which “Copilot” are you looking at?

Microsoft uses the Copilot name for several different products, which confuses a lot of people. Here’s the short version:

When people search “microsoft copilot”, they usually mean the first one: the consumer assistant you download from the App Store or Google Play. The App Store listing shows the app as free with in-app purchases.

What the free Copilot app does

The free app is a general-purpose chat assistant, similar to ChatGPT or Gemini. You can ask questions, draft and rewrite text, summarize things, brainstorm, and create images.

Microsoft’s fall 2025 release added several features that are still core to the app. These include Groups, which PCMag reported lets up to 32 people chat with Copilot in one shared conversation, a memory feature that remembers your preferences between chats, and Mico, an animated companion character. You can view and manage what Copilot remembers about you.

Some details are unclear or vary:

• Usage limits. Microsoft’s paid plans promise “higher usage than free”, but the official plan page doesn’t spell out the free tier’s limits. We saw one unofficial figure for daily messages that we couldn’t confirm, so we’re not repeating it.
• Regional availability. Features can differ by country, device and platform.

How to get started

1. Install Microsoft Copilot from the Apple App Store or Google Play. Check that the publisher is Microsoft Corporation. On Windows, Copilot comes built in or is in the Microsoft Store, and on the web it’s at copilot.microsoft.com.
2. Sign in with a personal Microsoft account (Outlook.com, Hotmail, Xbox or your Microsoft 365 account). Signing in is what enables chat history, memory and any paid benefits you have.
3. If you already pay for Microsoft 365 Personal, Family, Premium or Pro, sign in with that same account so your plan’s Copilot limits apply.
4. Go through the app’s settings for memory and personalization and choose what Copilot can remember.

Only download Copilot from official stores or Microsoft’s own sites. Third-party “Copilot” apps and APK mirrors aren’t from Microsoft.

Paid plans: what you get by upgrading

The standalone Copilot Pro subscription no longer exists. Thurrott reported that Microsoft replaced it with Microsoft 365 Premium, which combines Microsoft 365 Family and the old Copilot Pro features for the same $19.99 a month. Copilot is now sold as part of Microsoft 365 consumer plans, not as its own product.

Here’s what Microsoft’s Copilot for individuals page listed when we checked (US prices):

All paid tiers bring Copilot into Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneDrive and Teams. Microsoft lists features for individuals such as Researcher and Analyst for deeper research and data work, Cowork for multi-step tasks, and AI Restyle for photos in OneDrive. According to Microsoft, Premium and Pro add features the cheaper tiers don’t have, including limited agentic AI for advanced research and analytics. Usage limits apply on every plan.

Which plan makes sense?

• Casual questions and occasional writing help: start with the free app.
• You already pay for Microsoft 365 Personal or Family: you already have Copilot in the Office apps, so try it there before upgrading.
• You use Copilot heavily in Word, Excel or PowerPoint, or need Researcher and Analyst regularly: Premium is the tier Microsoft built for that.
• Pro: Microsoft lists it at $99.99 a month with the highest limits. It’s clearly aimed at very heavy individual users, and most people won’t need it.

If you have an old Copilot Pro subscription, it doesn’t switch over automatically. Reports suggest moving to Premium is a manual step, and secondary sources give different end dates for existing Copilot Pro subscriptions. Check Subscriptions in your Microsoft account for what applies to you.

What’s new: Home, Code and Autopilot

On September 25, 2026, Microsoft announced what coverage called its biggest Copilot overhaul yet, built around three areas. This summary comes from TechRepublic and Redmond Magazine:

• Home: a new starting screen that brings together Chat and Cowork. It shows recent activity and suggestions, and Word, Excel and PowerPoint are built directly into the app.
• Code: describe an app, tracker, dashboard or automation in plain language and Copilot builds it. Reports say it uses the same underlying technology as GitHub Copilot and can host the apps inside a company’s Microsoft 365 tenant.
• Autopilot: an agent that keeps running and carries out work on its own. It was previously called Scout.

Most of this isn’t widely available yet, and much of it is aimed at work accounts. Coverage says Home and Code go first to members of Microsoft’s Frontier early-access program, and Autopilot is in private preview with usage-based billing. Reports gave slightly different preview timing, and full pricing for these features hadn’t been published in the coverage we found. Third-party trackers also suggest the Home experience reached Frontier in October rather than general availability. If you’re on the free consumer app, don’t expect to see these tabs right away.

Microsoft is also moving business users of the Microsoft 365 Copilot app to a single app for personal and work accounts. Admin-focused sites report the web address is changing to copilot.cloud.microsoft, with more redirects expected in early November. That’s a work-side change. The free consumer app isn’t affected in the same way.

Privacy and control tips

• Check memory regularly. If Copilot remembers something you don’t want stored, remove it in the app’s memory settings.
• Keep work and personal separate. Sign in to the consumer app with your personal Microsoft account. Use your organization’s approved Microsoft 365 Copilot for work data, since that version runs under your employer’s policies.
• Be careful in Groups. Anyone in a shared Copilot conversation can see what’s posted there.

Bottom line

Microsoft Copilot is worth trying for free. It’s a capable everyday assistant, and the app is a quick download. Pay only if you want Copilot working inside your Office documents or need higher limits, and remember that Copilot Pro has become Microsoft 365 Premium. The Home, Code and Autopilot revamp is the bigger story for the next few months, but as of late October 2026 most of it is still in previews aimed at business users, so wait for general availability before it affects what you buy.