Bringing AI assistance to basic plans in Microsoft Planner

Microsoft

Mar 09, 2026

Today, we are excited to announce that the Project Manager Agent in Microsoft Planner has been officially renamed to "Planner Agent," and its powerful AI-driven features will be generally available across both plan types. This means that basic and premium plan users with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license will have access to intelligent Planner Agent capabilities that help streamline project management and task work. Previously, users could try these agentic features in premium plans only.

The rebranding to "Planner Agent" reflects its role as an integrated part of the Planner experience and ensures naming consistency. You will see the new name and icon reflected across the Planner app's user interfaces and all supporting documentation going forward.

Planner Agent for basic plan users: New AI features coming your way

Planner Agent's capabilities are expanding to basic plans for the first time. Starting this week, organizations and users of basic plans will begin to see Planner Agent enabled in their Planner experience. This update brings intelligent, AI-driven assistance to all Planner users, even those without a premium license. Our goal is to empower every team to work smarter with Planner.

For the initial release in basic plans, Planner Agent will introduce two major AI-driven features:

Status reports: The Planner Agent can automate the creation of status reports for your plans. This capability streamlines the process to generate, view, modify, and share status reports based on project progress. The agent produces a concise, accurate, and professional report summarized from your plan's progress, key milestones, and upcoming tasks. With this feature, you can ensure stakeholders stay informed effortlessly, saving time while maintaining transparency and alignment across your projects. Instead of spending hours manually gathering updates, the Planner Agent prepares a draft status report at the click of a button — highlighting what has been accomplished, what is on track, and any pending inputs.
Task execution: Basic plan users will now be able to have the Planner Agent work on tasks within their plans. You can assign a specific task to the Planner Agent just as you would assign it to a team member. The agent will then carry out the task and attach the results or output back to the task. Results are captured in a Loop page embedded within the task, allowing all plan members to collaborate on and review the output. This capability enables your team to offload routine or time-consuming tasks to the AI assistant, helping everyone focus on more strategic work.

Suggested alt text: A screenshot of Planner for the web shows a task card with output provided by Planner agent in a Loop component and feedback that reads, “Need your input to complete this task. Answer the question in this Loop file, then regenerate.”

These two features — status report generation and task execution — are the first Planner Agent skills for basic plans. They represent a significant step in bringing intelligent project management assistance to all Planner users, not just in premium plans. We will begin a phased rollout of these capabilities in basic plans starting this week, and we expect all eligible tenants to receive the update in the coming weeks.

Planner Agent for premium plan users: Continuity in capabilities

Planner Plan 1, Planner and Project Plan 3, and Planner and Project Plan 5 users with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license who have already been using the preview of the Project Manager agent will continue to enjoy AI capabilities uninterrupted under the new Planner Agent branding.

What stays the same for premium plans? In a word: everything (except the name). There are no functional changes associated with this rename. The Planner Agent still offers the full feature set that was available during preview, including:

Task generation – Given a project goal or objective, the Planner Agent can automatically generate a structured plan with a set of suggested tasks, effectively jump-starting your project planning process. The agent takes your goals and breaks them down into actionable tasks. To help you get started, predefined and customizable templates on various topics are available, allowing you to quickly kickstart a plan and tailor it to meet your specific goals.
Task assignment – You retain full control over how work is distributed. Tasks can be assigned to team members or directly to the Planner Agent for autonomous completion. In premium plans, the agent is available in all existing premium plans shared with a Microsoft 365 Group, as well as in new plans created using agent-powered templates.
Automated task execution – The Planner Agent can be assigned to certain tasks to complete them autonomously. When you assign a task to the agent, it will work on it and produce detailed output captured in an embedded Loop page within each task. All plan members can collaborate directly in that Loop page, and the agent will incorporate feedback to refine its responses.
Copilot chat – This is the conversational AI experience in Microsoft Planner that lets you ask questions about your plan and tasks in it to help your work move forward. You can quickly understand status, priorities, and next steps across your plan—without digging through tasks or updates. Planner Agent Chat turns natural language into clear guidance and actions, helping you make consistent progress with less effort.

A screenshot of Planner in Teams shows a premium plan in Grid view with the Planner Agent Chat pane open to the right.

Premium users also benefit from features such as the Goals tab, where you can generate a list of tasks for each goal and use the built-in file picker to add resources as context, enabling the agent to deliver more accurate and contextually relevant responses. Additionally, the Board view lets you group tasks by the agent's progress status — from tasks not yet assigned to the agent, to those ready for review after the agent has completed execution.

What about other Planner Agent features for basic plans?

We know that basic plan users will be eager to get the full range of Planner's AI capabilities. At launch, basic plans will support the two agent features outlined above — status report generation and task execution. However, this is just the beginning for Planner Agent in basic plans.

Over the coming months, we plan to introduce more AI features to basic plan users, gradually expanding the capabilities available. Our team is actively working on broadening Planner Agent's skillset in basic plans, and you can expect to see updates that bring additional AI-powered capabilities. We will share details on these upcoming enhancements as they become ready, so stay tuned for future announcements.

The introduction of Planner Agent to all plan types in Planner marks an important milestone in our journey to bring AI-powered productivity to everyone. Whether you prefer to use basic plans or premium plans, you will now have an intelligent assistant in Planner that can help reduce the manual effort of organizing plans, tracking status, and executing tasks. This change reflects our commitment to empowering every Planner user — from small teams to large enterprises — with tools that help you achieve more with less effort.

To explore these capabilities, customers are required to have a Microsoft 365 Copilot license.

We invite you to try out the Planner Agent today. Premium users can continue leveraging all the agent's capabilities as before (now under the new name), and basic users will start seeing the new agent features become available in their plans as the rollout progresses. Give these AI features a spin in your next project — ask the Planner Agent to generate a status report for an ongoing plan or have it tackle a routine task for you.

Thank you for being part of our Planner community, and we look forward to seeing how you use the new Planner Agent to work smarter and achieve more with your plans. Try out Planner Agent today and let us know what you think! Select More (circled question mark icon) in the top right corner of the app, then select Feedback from the dropdown menu.

We also encourage you to share any feature requests by adding your ideas to the Planner Feedback Portal. Your feedback helps inform our feature updates, and we look forward to hearing from you.