Understanding Microsoft 365 Copilot and Copilot Chat in Office Apps

• M365 Copilot for Office Applications primarily assists individuals but can streamline Office-centric processes for some incremental gains.
• Copilot Chat, available in Office apps without an M365 Copilot license, may meet users’ needs initially, but the variety of apps suggests most will need licenses.
• M365 Copilot will include Anthropic models for select Office apps, but those models are subject to Anthropic’s data privacy policies and not Microsoft’s.
• Governance and training are required for using these tools effectively, mitigating a potential decline in quality.

Microsoft 365 Copilot for Office apps can accelerate routine tasks such as creating standard documents, simplifying data analysis, summarizing reports, and preparing for meetings. All enterprise Office users have Copilot Chat in core Office apps while licensed M365 Copilot users access advanced features and more applications. Although measuring productivity gains is a challenge, M365 Copilot usage reports and Viva Pulse surveys can help. However, there are few measures for the quality of work produced, so governance and training are critical to achieving success. Despite this quality concern, M365 Copilot for Office apps is a key consideration for M365 Copilot purchase decisions because the variety of Office applications suggests every user can benefit.