Forum Discussion
Copilot Licensing questions
- Sep 18, 2026
Hello WillBee1 , declarative and custom engine agents can both be created using Copilot Studio & declarative agents can also be created using Agent Builder.
Here are my inputs on your question for licensing for the tools (not the type of agents). I hope this helps.
How to interpret my terms:-
- "licensed user" - users who is assigned Copilot premium license
- "unlicensed user" - users who use Copilot Chat basic that comes with their E3/E5 license
For Agent Builder
- Creation
- Both licensed and unlicensed users can create agents using Agent Builder - this is accessed directly within Copilot app (unlicensed users have limited access to functionalities e.g. they cannot add knowledge such as SharePoint)
- Sharing & Using
- Both licensed and unlicensed users can share agents using Agent Builder (you have to take note of feature compatibility e.g. if a licensed user has created an agent that uses SharePoint knowledge, that agent cannot be used by an unlicensed user because that feature is not available to them)
For Copilot Studio
- Creation
- Licensed users can create agents using Copilot Studio. There is an admin setting to configure if all licensed users can do this.
- Unlicensed users normally cannot create agents using Copilot Studio. But they can sign up for a trial and access it.
- Sharing
- Same as above, licensed users can share agents created in Copilot Studio.
- The agent can also be shared with unlicensed users (but this would be in environments other than Dev & require credit to be allocated to the environment).
- When ALM applies where a solution containing agent is moved from Dev environment to Test environment to Production environment, you'd need different roles to be able to do certain things in certain environments. You'd have to work with your Admin on this.
- Using
- Agents built in Copilot Studio can be accessed via. Copilot Studio (this is more for testing), Copilot, Teams and other channels. You can decide this when selecting channels for the agent in Copilot Studio.
- Licensed users can use these (credits apply for certain operations)
- Unlicensed users can also use these agents. But as shared above, this would be other than Dev environments & the environment would require credits to be assigned.
Note - Tenant configurations can impact the above so that would need to be checked
Hello WillBee1 , declarative and custom engine agents can both be created using Copilot Studio & declarative agents can also be created using Agent Builder.
Here are my inputs on your question for licensing for the tools (not the type of agents). I hope this helps.
How to interpret my terms:-
- "licensed user" - users who is assigned Copilot premium license
- "unlicensed user" - users who use Copilot Chat basic that comes with their E3/E5 license
For Agent Builder
- Creation
- Both licensed and unlicensed users can create agents using Agent Builder - this is accessed directly within Copilot app (unlicensed users have limited access to functionalities e.g. they cannot add knowledge such as SharePoint)
- Sharing & Using
- Both licensed and unlicensed users can share agents using Agent Builder (you have to take note of feature compatibility e.g. if a licensed user has created an agent that uses SharePoint knowledge, that agent cannot be used by an unlicensed user because that feature is not available to them)
For Copilot Studio
- Creation
- Licensed users can create agents using Copilot Studio. There is an admin setting to configure if all licensed users can do this.
- Unlicensed users normally cannot create agents using Copilot Studio. But they can sign up for a trial and access it.
- Sharing
- Same as above, licensed users can share agents created in Copilot Studio.
- The agent can also be shared with unlicensed users (but this would be in environments other than Dev & require credit to be allocated to the environment).
- When ALM applies where a solution containing agent is moved from Dev environment to Test environment to Production environment, you'd need different roles to be able to do certain things in certain environments. You'd have to work with your Admin on this.
- Using
- Agents built in Copilot Studio can be accessed via. Copilot Studio (this is more for testing), Copilot, Teams and other channels. You can decide this when selecting channels for the agent in Copilot Studio.
- Licensed users can use these (credits apply for certain operations)
- Unlicensed users can also use these agents. But as shared above, this would be other than Dev environments & the environment would require credits to be assigned.
Note - Tenant configurations can impact the above so that would need to be checked