--- id: copilot-which-copilot-do-you-have lang: en track: copilot title: "Which Copilot do you have?" seoTitle: "Which Copilot do you have? Licences" description: "Work out which Microsoft Copilot licence your organisation gave you, what each tier includes, how to check yours, and what to ask IT for if it isn't enough." part: getting-started partTitle: "Getting started with Copilot" partOrder: 2 order: 1 level: Beginner durationMinutes: 5 outcome: "Identify which Copilot licence you have, what it includes, and what to ask IT for if it isn't enough." summary: "Your organisation's IT chose your Copilot, so work out which tier you actually have, what it unlocks, and what to ask for if you need more." draft: false updated: "2026-10-14" furtherReading: - title: "Microsoft 365 Copilot pricing" url: "https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365-copilot/pricing" note: "Microsoft's current prices for each Copilot plan." - title: "Microsoft 365 Copilot for enterprise" url: "https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365-copilot/pricing/enterprise" note: "Enterprise pricing and what the paid add-on includes." - title: "Microsoft Copilot Studio" url: "https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365-copilot/microsoft-copilot-studio" note: "Microsoft's overview of building custom agents and automations." - title: "Copilot app updates for personal, work, and school accounts" url: "https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/microsoft-365-copilot/learning/changes-microsoft-copilot-app" note: "How the Copilot app differs for personal, work and school accounts." keywords: - Copilot licence - Microsoft 365 Copilot tiers - Copilot Chat vs Microsoft 365 Copilot - check your Copilot licence - Copilot for work accounts - ask IT for Copilot quiz: intro: "Five quick questions. Ace them all and the next lesson unlocks." passScore: 5 questions: - q: "Who usually decides which Copilot tier you get?" options: - "You, by picking a plan in Copilot's settings" - "Your organisation's IT or procurement team, through the Microsoft 365 licence" - "Microsoft, based on how often you use Copilot Chat" answer: 1 explain: "Your organisation's IT or procurement team decides, through the Microsoft 365 licence, not you individually." - q: "How can you tell if you have just Copilot Chat versus the full paid add-on?" options: - "Whether Copilot shows up in Teams" - "Whether Copilot's answers come with citations" - "Whether a Copilot pane appears inside apps like Word, Excel or Outlook" - "Whether you can open copilot.microsoft.com" answer: 2 explain: "Look for a Copilot pane inside apps like Word, Excel or Outlook. If Copilot only shows up in Teams or as a standalone chat, you're on Copilot Chat." - q: "What should you do if you don't see Copilot anywhere?" options: - "Ask IT or your manager whether it's licensed for your role or department yet" - "Buy a Copilot licence for yourself" - "Use the free consumer Copilot for your work files instead" answer: 0 explain: "Ask IT or your manager whether it's licensed for your role or department yet, rather than assuming you need to buy something yourself. Many organisations roll it out gradually, so \"not yet\" is a common answer." - q: "True or false: like Claude, you can personally upgrade your own Copilot plan without going through IT." options: - "True, upgrading works the same way as in Claude" - "False, Copilot licensing runs through your organisation's Microsoft 365 tenant" - "True, as long as you already have Copilot Chat" answer: 1 explain: "False. Copilot licensing runs through your organisation's Microsoft 365 tenant, so a change goes through IT, not a plan menu of your own." - q: "You want a Copilot-powered task to run automatically on a schedule instead of typing it by hand each time. What should you ask IT about?" options: - "A personal upgrade to the paid Microsoft 365 Copilot add-on" - "The free consumer Copilot in Windows" - "A Copilot pane in Word" - "Copilot Studio, as a workflow-automation request" answer: 3 explain: "Copilot Studio, for building a custom agent or automation. Frame it as a workflow-automation request, not a personal licence upgrade." pass: badge: "Perfect score" title: "You know which Copilot you've got." body: "Full marks. You can tell which tier you're on, what it unlocks, and what to ask IT for. Next up: first steps in Copilot, where it lives and how to send a message that gets something useful back." retry: "Check the marked answers and give it another go. You've got this." --- > **Level:** Beginner ยท **Reading time:** ~5 min > > **What you'll be able to do:** identify which Copilot licence you have, what it includes, and what to ask IT for if it isn't enough. ## Why this isn't a "pick a plan" question If you've used Claude, you're used to choosing your own plan and upgrading yourself the moment you hit a limit. Copilot doesn't work that way. It's licensed through your organisation's Microsoft 365 tenant, usually rolled out department by department rather than to everyone at once, and usually decided by IT or procurement rather than by you. So the useful skill here isn't choosing. It's figuring out what you've already got, and knowing exactly what to ask for if it isn't enough. ## The tiers, decoded - **Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat.** Included at no extra cost for anyone with an eligible Microsoft 365 work account. Web-grounded chat with citations, Copilot built into a handful of apps, and enterprise data protection, meaning your prompts and company data aren't used to train the models. Best for: everyday questions and drafting, the same way you'd use Claude's own chat. This is the one most people already have without realising it. - **Microsoft 365 Copilot** (the paid add-on). Roughly $30/user/month on [annual enterprise pricing](https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365-copilot/pricing). For smaller organisations, the Copilot Business add-on is $18/user/month on an annual plan, a promotional price for subscriptions bought until 31 December 2026; after that it is $21. Bundles with Microsoft 365 Business Standard or Business Premium run $23.50 to $32/user/month. Puts Copilot directly inside Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and Teams, adds "Work IQ" grounding in your own mail, files and meetings, and unlocks pre-built agents such as Researcher, Analyst and Facilitator. Best for: anyone whose day-to-day work lives inside Office apps and who wants Copilot acting on the actual document or inbox in front of them, not just answering questions about it. - **Copilot Studio.** For building custom agents and automations on top of Copilot, priced separately and based on usage capacity. IT and admin territory, not a personal choice; you'd request this through a project, not sign up for it yourself. Best for: a team that wants to build a repeatable, Copilot-powered workflow (an intake form, a report generator) rather than use Copilot chat by chat. - The free consumer **Copilot** at [copilot.microsoft.com](https://copilot.microsoft.com) or built into Windows is a *different product* entirely. It doesn't see your work files, mailbox, or calendar, and it isn't covered by your organisation's data protections. Best for: personal use outside of work. Don't confuse the two, and don't paste anything work-related into it. These tiers aren't mutually exclusive. A team can have the full paid add-on for everyday work and a separate Copilot Studio project running underneath it for one specific workflow; the two are billed and managed separately, but nothing stops an organisation having both.
Three tiers, decodedThree Copilot tiers as a ladder. Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat: free, included with an eligible work account, web-grounded chat with citations. Microsoft 365 Copilot: about 30 dollars a user a month, in Word, Excel, Outlook, Teams, plus Work IQ and pre-built agents. Copilot Studio: custom pricing, for building agents and automations, IT and admin territory.Three tiers, decoded1Microsoft 365 Copilot ChatIncluded with an eligible work account.Web-grounded chat with citations.Free2Microsoft 365 CopilotIn Word, Excel, Outlook, Teams, plus Work IQand pre-built agents.~$30/user/mo3Copilot StudioBuilding custom agents and automations.IT and admin territory.Custom
## How to tell which one you have - **Copilot icon in Teams, or at [copilot.cloud.microsoft](https://copilot.cloud.microsoft), and nowhere else:** you're on Copilot Chat. - **A Copilot pane shows up inside Word, Excel or Outlook while you're working:** you have the full paid add-on. - **No Copilot anywhere:** it may not be licensed for your role or department yet, or it's rolling out on a schedule you haven't reached. ## What to actually do about it Once you know where you stand, the next move depends on which of these you're in. **You have Copilot Chat, and it's not enough.** You're hitting its limits because you want Copilot working inside a specific document, or reading your calendar and inbox directly rather than answering general questions. Go to IT or procurement and ask specifically whether the full Microsoft 365 Copilot add-on is licensed for your team, and if not, what the business case process looks like. Naming the specific capability you're missing (a Copilot pane in Word, Work IQ grounding in your inbox) gets a faster, more concrete answer than "can I get Copilot upgraded." **You have the full add-on, and you keep hitting the edge of what chat can do.** If you find yourself wanting the same Copilot-powered task to run automatically, on a schedule, or triggered by an event rather than typed by hand each time, that's a Copilot Studio conversation, not a licence upgrade. Flag it to IT as a workflow-automation request, not a personal feature request; Copilot Studio projects are usually built and owned by IT or a specific team, not licensed to individuals. **Nothing shows up at all.** Before assuming you need something new, check with IT or your manager whether Copilot is licensed for your role yet. Many organisations roll this out gradually by department, so "not yet" is a common, unremarkable answer, and it's worth asking again in a few months rather than assuming you've been left out. A concrete ask beats a vague one in any of these three situations. Take the first: instead of writing to IT "can I get Copilot upgraded," try something like, "I want to use Copilot directly inside Word for drafting and review, and have it read my calendar so it can brief me before meetings. Is the full Microsoft 365 Copilot add-on licensed for my team, and if not, what's the process to request it?" That's specific enough for IT to act on in one reply, because they can check licensing against the exact capability you named rather than guessing what "upgraded" means. The same principle carries into the other two situations: naming the exact automation you want ("run this weekly without me typing it") routes you to Copilot Studio faster than "can Copilot do more," and naming your role and team when nothing shows up gets a faster, more specific answer than a general "is Copilot coming." ## Try it Open Teams or [copilot.cloud.microsoft](https://copilot.cloud.microsoft) and look for Copilot. Then open a document in Word or a sheet in Excel and check whether a Copilot pane appears there too. Whichever combination you find tells you which tier you're on, and which of the three situations above applies to you. ## Key terms [Copilot Chat](/glossary#copilot-chat), [Microsoft 365 Copilot](/glossary#microsoft-365-copilot), [Copilot Studio](/glossary#copilot-studio), [Work IQ](/glossary#work-iq), [Copilot](/glossary#copilot)