Introducing GitHub Pre-Purchase Plans: A Simpler Way to Plan Your GitHub Spend

Microsoft

Jun 17, 2026

As AI-powered development scales, more of what organizations pay for on GitHub is shifting from fixed per-seat pricing to usage-based billing. GitHub Copilot, Actions, Codespaces, AI Credits: spend now reflects what teams actually build, and that can vary month to month.

For most engineering and finance leaders, that raises a familiar question: how do you set a confident annual budget when consumption is variable? How do you capture the savings that come with committing upfront?

That is what GitHub Pre-Purchase Plans are for. Commit to an amount upfront, use it across eligible GitHub services over a 12-month term, and receive built-in savings based on the size of the commitment. Variable usage becomes a plan. Builders keep building, and finance teams get a number they can count on.

Microsoft is introducing two GitHub Pre-Purchase Plans (P3) for commercial customers, both available through Azure Reservations:

How the plans work

The model is the same for both plans:

Commit upfront. Choose a pre-purchase tier that fits your expected GitHub usage.
Receive built-in savings. Larger commitments unlock higher discount tiers, up to 15%.
Draw down as you go. Eligible usage consumes from the prepaid balance over the 12-month term.
Replenish or shift to pay-as-you-go. If usage exceeds the prepaid amount, purchase another plan or continue with pay-as-you-go billing where available.

Commit units are available for the plan term and do not carry over after the term ends.

Why choose a Pre-Purchase Plan?

Pre-Purchase Plans are not replacing how you buy GitHub today. They provide another option for customers who have a reasonable view of expected usage and want to plan ahead.

The value is straightforward:

Simpler purchasing with one prepaid commitment instead of managing multiple separate charges across GitHub services.
Built-in savings compared with pay-as-you-go pricing. The more you commit, the greater the discount.
Alignment with Azure billing. GitHub usage is billed through the Azure subscription linked to your GitHub organization, so Pre-Purchase Plans fit into the same planning motions you already use for Azure commitments.

Pricing*:

Both plans use the same published tier structure:

*Pricing as of June 2026 and is subject to change. Customers should review the latest documentation before purchasing.

**Example if GitHub Enterprise generates a retail cost of $100, then 100 GitHub Commit Units (GCUs) are consumed

Two examples

Planning across the GitHub platform

Suppose an organization expects about $500,000 in eligible GitHub usage over the next year across GitHub Copilot, GitHub Enterprise, GitHub Advanced Security, Actions, and GitHub AI Credits. With the GitHub Pre-Purchase Plan, the organization chooses the 500,000 commit unit tier, pays $425,000 upfront, and applies that commitment across eligible services over the 12-month term. That gives the team one platform-wide commitment with 15% built-in savings.

Planning for AI credit consumption

Another organization's biggest source of variability is GitHub AI Credits as Copilot and agentic development expand. Instead of using a broader platform commitment, that team chooses the GitHub AI Credits Pre-Purchase Plan so AI Credit usage draws down from a dedicated prepaid balance. This is a better fit when the main goal is to plan specifically around AI credit consumption.

How Pre-Purchase Plans relate to Microsoft Agent Pre-Purchase Plan

If you are also evaluating the Microsoft Agent Pre-Purchase Plan, here is the distinction: that plan is broader than GitHub and covers eligible usage across Microsoft Foundry, Copilot Studio, Fabric, and GitHub.

Choose a GitHub Pre-Purchase Plan when GitHub is the platform you are planning around. Choose Microsoft Agent Pre-Purchase Plan when the goal is agent development spanning the wider Microsoft platform