Copilot Chat vsus. Microsoft 365 Copilot What's the difference?
While their names sound similar at first glance - Microsoft 365 Copilot and Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat - they differ in several aspects. And more importantly, one can't be without another. What is Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat? First since first. Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat is also called Copilot Chat. Copilot Chat generates answers based on web content, while Microsoft 365 Copilot is also grounded on users' data, like emails, meetings, files, and more. Since January 15, Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat is available for everyone. Everyone in organizations. Also customers with a Microsoft 365 Business Basic subscriptions can enjoy using Copilot Chat securily. The screenshot below shows how Copilot Chat looks like and highlights its main capabilities. Note that EDP - Enterprise Data Protection is available. What is Microsoft 365 Copilot? Microsoft 365 Copilot is an add-on available for specific Microsoft 365 Subscriptions: Microsoft 365 E3, E5, A3, A5, and Business Standard & Premium. It includes Copilot Chat in addition to other Copilot features: Microsoft 365 Copilot also includes a chat grounded on users' meetings, emails, chats, and documents. It integrates into Microsoft 365 apps, like Outlook, Teams, Word, Excel, and more. It brings the capability to create agents and additional Copilot management features such as SharePoint Advanced Management and Copilot Dashboard. The screenshot below shows how the Copilot chat experience for those users who got the Microsoft 365 Copilot license. Note that EDP - Enterprise Data Protection is available here too. Copilot Chat can be pinned in MS Teams and MS Outlook as App. How can I access Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat? Copilot Chat is nowadays accessible via m365copilot.com using your Entra account. In contrast to Microsoft 365 Copilot licensed users, Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat users cannot see, by default, Copilot Chat pinned on the Microsoft 365 homepage. Microsoft 365 Copilot Administrators will have to pin the chat in the admin center so it is easy for Copilot Chat users to access it. What's the difference? There are some aspects, such as licensing requirements, subscription fees, data sources, or access to organization content, that determine the differences between Copilot Chat and Microsoft 365 Copilot. I have listed it in the screenshot below. 👇 Image showing a 3-column table: Aspect, Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat, and Microsoft 365 Copilot.
Change Default for Copilot Automatic Room Rebooking Setting in Outlook?
My users with Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses have noticed a newer feature that automatically rebooks meetings with an alternate room if the selected room is unavailable. It appears that this setting is on by default and can be turned off on a per case basis when a new meeting event is being scheduled. Is there a way to turn it off by default and allow people to enable it when a new calendar item is being created instead? Here is what it looks like for me in Outlook. I can click on Edit from the new meeting window and turn it off for a single event. I haven't found a way to change that default behavior. Has anyone found a way to adjust this? Thank you! Brian
Custom Engine Agent latency 5-7 seconds before webhook is called
We have a Teams bot that we recently extended with Microsoft 365 Copilot support using the copilotAgents.customEngineAgents manifest configuration. When users send messages to our agent through the Copilot sidebar, there's a consistent 5-7 second delay between when the user sends the message and when our Bot Framework webhook receives the activity. Some extra notes: When users message the same bot directly in Teams (not through Copilot), messages arrive immediately with no delay When we send messages from our backend to Copilot (using the serviceUrl for proactive messaging), they arrive immediately with no delay So the latency only occurs in one direction: Copilot → our webhook. Manifest Configuration: { "$schema": "https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/json-schemas/teams/v1.17/MicrosoftTeams.schema.json", "manifestVersion": "1.21", "version": "1.1.1", "bots": [ { "botId": "<client_id>", "scopes": ["personal", "team", "groupChat"], "isNotificationOnly": false, "supportsCalling": false, "supportsVideo": false } ], "copilotAgents": { "customEngineAgents": [ { "type": "bot", "id": "<client_id>" } ] } } Environment: Azure Bot Service (not Copilot Studio) Bot region: Global Messaging endpoint hosted in AWS us-east-1 Questions: Is this delay expected behavior for Custom Engine Agents? Is there any configuration to reduce this latency? Are there plans to optimize Custom Engine Agent message routing? This latency significantly impacts user experience - users expect near-instant responses when chatting with an agent.
Typed input routing stops working after navigating back to Home topic via Action.Submit (Invoke)
We are building a Copilot Studio agent with this structure: Home topic (menu page with icons) FeatureTopicA / FeatureTopicB / FeatureTopicC / FeatureTopicD Routing based on typed text (e.g. “feature A”, “feature B”) using a topic with trigger “A message is received” Navigation between topics using Action.Submit buttons (Invoke), including a Home / Back icon Observed behavior On a fresh conversation: Typing keywords like feature A or feature B correctly routes to the expected topic. From any feature topic, clicking Home (Action.Submit → Go to Home topic): Home page loads correctly. After returning to Home, typing the same keywords: Routing does not happen The conversation remains on Home The “A message is received” router topic is not triggered Restarting the conversation makes typing work again — until Home is reached via button navigation. We already tried following Dedicated router topic with trigger “A message is received” and highest priority Clearing global/custom variables when returning to Home Forcing routing using global flags Ensuring Home topic has no message trigger and no phrases Using Invoke-only navigation topics Handling text via Recognizer.TriggeringMessage.Text, LastMessage.Text, etc. Core questions Is this expected behavior in Copilot Studio? After navigating to a topic via Action.Submit (Invoke), does that topic “own” subsequent typed messages? What is the recommended pattern if users must be able to: Navigate via Home / Back buttons Then type free-text on the Home page Have typed text routed reliably every time Is the intended design: Home topic acts as the router itself? Or only one global message-received router should exist? Or typed input should not be expected to work reliably after Invoke navigation? We want to allow users to: Use menu buttons for navigation Return to Home Still type free-text commands Have routing work consistently without restarting the conversation Any official guidance, known limitations, or best-practice patterns would be greatly appreciated.Adaptive Cards Input.Date shows mm/dd/yyyy on sample site but renders as “September 20, 2017”
Hi all, I’m using Adaptive Cards Input.Date in Microsoft Teams / Copilot Studio (Teams channel). I noticed the same card renders the date differently depending on host: On the Adaptive Cards Inputs sample page, the Due Date field shows mm/dd/yyyy (e.g., 09/20/2017). But when I copy the same JSON into Adaptive Card Designer (and similarly inside Teams), the date shows as a long format (e.g., September 20, 2017). Reference page (shows mm/dd/yyyy): https://adaptivecards-release-ci.azurewebsites.net/samples/Inputs.html I want the date displayed as mm/dd/yyyy in Teams (and ideally allow typing in that format), e.g. 12/20/2025. { "type": "AdaptiveCard", "$schema": "http://adaptivecards.io/schemas/adaptive-card.json", "version": "1.5", "body": [ { "type": "TextBlock", "text": "Due Date" }, { "type": "Input.Date", "id": "DateVal", "value": "2017-09-20" } ] } Questions Is it possible to force the display format of Input.Date to mm/dd/yyyy via Adaptive Card schema/JSON? Or is the display format always controlled by the host (Teams) / locale and cannot be overridden? If it cannot be forced, what’s the recommended workaround in Teams? Example: use Input.Text with validation? or show helper text under the field? Environment: Adaptive Cards in Teams via Copilot Studio. Ashish
Overview of Copilot solutions and Key Benefits
Copilot isn’t one-size-fits-all. Each solution addresses different organizational needs. Here’s what they do—and why they matter. Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat is a conversational experience on web and mobile that delivers quick, context-aware answers from organizational data. It provides quick, context-aware answers from organizational data, improving responsiveness across departments while supporting mobile work scenarios. Microsoft 365 Copilot is an AI assistant built into Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Teams. It accelerates document creation, data analysis, and presentations and helps you catch up on meetings and messages. Copilot uses the context you already have in Microsoft 365—files, emails, chats, and calendars—through Microsoft Graph and respects the same permissions, security, and compliance your organization relies on. Microsoft Copilot Studio is a platform for extensibility and customization. It lets you build custom copilots and extend existing ones without writing code. Copilot Studio allows businesses to tailor AI to unique workflows without heavy development investment, accelerating innovation. Key benefits for organizations Copilot delivers three core benefits that impact the entire organization: Benefit How benefit achieved Example scenario Boost productivity by automating repetitive tasks. Copilot automates repetitive tasks and accelerates content creation across teams. A marketing team might use Copilot in Word to draft campaign briefs based on brand guidelines, reducing turnaround time from days to hours. Improve decision quality with data-driven insights. Copilot provides fast, data-driven insights, enabling better decisions at every level. An operations team might use Copilot in Excel to analyze supply chain data and identify cost-saving opportunities before quarterly reviews. Strengthen governance with enterprise-grade compliance. Copilot respects enterprise security and compliance standards, ensuring sensitive data stays protected. When legal teams draft contracts, Copilot uses only authorized organizational data through Microsoft Graph, maintaining compliance with internal policies and regulatory requirements.So many different CoPilots - confusing, unproductive
I think we have all learned that CoPilot is a brand, a suite of tools. That probably makes sense from Microsoft perspective, but it is confusing as heck for end users or people trying to roll out CoPilot in a company. Products include: Sharepoint agents CoPilot desktop app Copilot in Office apps -- different copilots for PPT, Word, excel, Outlook CoPilot Studio - custom copilots (which by the way turn into "apps"???) Teams Copilot Researcher and Analyst Agents Prompting Coach Visual Creator What is even more frustrating is they don't all work together or in the same environments. I want to call my Sharepoint Agent from my Copilot, nope. I want my Custom Copilot to use Researcher (or vice versa even), not happening (despite Copilot giving me instructions on how it should). Meanwhile, in Anthropic-land, I setup an MCP service to integrate Claude and my to do app. Not without hiccups, but it works now. The whole Copilot ecosystem needs to get a lot more consistent and quickly or you are going to continue to loose users. PS - as i went to post this, I needed to select Tags -- there were 20 Copilot products to choose from!
