What’s New in Microsoft 365 Copilot | May 2026
Welcome to the May 2026 edition of What's New in Microsoft 365 Copilot! Every month, we highlight new features and enhancements to keep Microsoft 365 admins up to date with Copilot features that help your users be more productive and efficient in the apps they use every day.
How are you connecting OKR tracking to Copilot workflows?
My manager asked me to figure out how we can use Copilot to help with our OKR process. Right now we track objectives in a SharePoint list and its a mess. People forget to update progress, key results are disconnected from daily work, and nobody looks at it until the end of quarter scramble. Has anyone found a way to bring OKR tracking closer to where people actually work in Teams/Copilot? Or is there a Teams app that handles this better than a spreadsheet?
Feature Proposal: OS-level Intelligent Task Organizer (Windows + Copilot)
A Idea about Intelligent Tasks organizer, I have to remember a lot of things during the team meetings like what is been said (we'll schedule a call or follow up etc.,) and what has been communicated in the emails (I'll get back to you after 2 weeks, or call us after two weeks) , And notes that I took in the notepad, or notepad ++,or sticky notes, or word, or one note. I want to chronologically display tasks on the right hand side of the laptop screen just like sticky note and it shall display all tasks one by one, it shall remove tasks are already complete (email sent with confirmation). and arrange, adjust every few mins according to priority/time or user added priority. App shall display small icon (just like chat) upon clicking it shall display ordered list of tasks. and desktop apps like teams/note/word/notepad++,sticky notes can participate by default or other apps like notepad++ can be onboarded manually in to the app. You can use a local model which infers the meaning of “I’ll call you in two weeks” - who is “I”? you or them? “Let’s follow up later” - task or casual statement? “I sent it” - which task did this complete? You can use a local model such that Corporate Teams/Outlook access may allow by corporate policy. Need to put much emphasis on false positives if the app keeps inventing tasks. Do not need to bring big LLMs in to the picture for inference, because of corporate policies may not allow. Microsoft provides operating system,office 365, tools with copilot, the inference can be possible because of all apps/content can be accessible at os level. Problem: Users capture tasks across multiple tools: Teams meetings and chats Outlook emails Notes (OneNote, Notepad, Sticky Notes, Word) Tasks become fragmented, untracked, and often lost. Proposed Solution: A lightweight system-level task layer integrated with Windows + Copilot that: Core Features Automatic task extraction From Teams, Outlook, notes, and user text Example interpretations: “I’ll call you in 2 weeks” “Let’s follow up later” Context-aware inference (local model) Identify: Task owner (“I” vs “you”) Priority signals Deadlines Minimize false positives Chronological task timeline Tasks auto-organized by: Time Priority Recency Floating task panel (desktop UI) Docked widget (like Sticky Notes or chat bubble) Expand/collapse view Always visible option Automatic task lifecycle tracking Detect completion: “Email sent” “File shared” Remove or mark complete automatically Continuous re-prioritization Adjust every few minutes based on: New inputs Deadlines User behavior Privacy-first architecture Use local models (SLM) instead of large cloud LLMs Enterprise admin control for data access Why this matters: Millions of users manually track tasks across fragmented tools, losing productivity daily. This feature would unify task understanding across the OS and M365 ecosystem.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 is built on top of the other. What is Copilot Chat (Basic)? First things first. Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat is often simply called Copilot Chat. Copilot Chat (Basic) generates answers based on web content, while Microsoft 365 Copilot (Premium) is also grounded on users' data, like emails, meetings, files, and more. Since early 2025, Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat has been available to all users in organizations, becoming the entry point to AI assistance for many organizations. Copilot Chat (Basic) is the foundational Copilot experience available at no extra cost for everyone with an eligible Microsoft 365 plan, including: Microsoft 365 E3 / E5 Microsoft 365 A3 / A5 Microsoft 365 Business Standard & Business Premium Copilot Chat (Basic) is secured, compliant, and it does not required the full Copilot add-on license. Copilot Chat (Basic) is able to ground responses on: Public web content. Content explicitly shared or work data manually uploaded to the chat by the user. On-screen content or content displayed on-screen in apps like Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote. When it comes to agents, Copilot Chat (Basic) offers these features: You can create your own declarative agents grounded on public web content with Agent Builder. You can use agents built by your org grounded on organizational data with the pay-as-you-go method. There are Microsoft prebuilt agents available like Prompt Coach, however Microsoft premium prebuilt agents like Researcher or Analyst are not included. The screenshot below shows how Copilot Chat looks and highlights its main capabilities. Note the Upgrade button, meaning this is not Microsoft 365 Copilot, but the Copilot Chat (Basic) experience. Note that EDP (Enterprise Data Protection) is available in Copilot Chat (Basic). What is Microsoft 365 Copilot (Premium)? Microsoft 365 Copilot (Premium) is a paid add-on license that builds on top of Copilot Chat and unlocks Copilot's full power. It is available for selected Microsoft 365 plans, including: Microsoft 365 E3 / E5 Microsoft 365 A3 / A5 Microsoft 365 Business Standard & Business Premium With a Microsoft 365 Copilot license, users get everything Copilot Chat (Basic) offers, plus much more: Data grounding: Microsoft 365 Copilot (Premium) includes Copilot Chat grounded on web and/or on user's Microsoft 365 data like emails, meetings, chats, and documents. Office apps: It integrates deeply into Microsoft 365 apps like Outlook, Teams, Word, Excel, and more. The integration includes features like Edit with Copilot allowing Copilot to adjust live your documents or email based on your prompts. Custom agents: It brings the capability to create your own declarative agents grounded in organizational data and/or web data. You can create agent either using Agent Builder or Copilot Studio. MS prebuilt agents: Premium prebuilt agents like Researcher and Analyst are included in Microsoft 365 Copilot (Premium). The screenshot below shows the Copilot chat experience for users who have a Microsoft 365 Copilot license. Note that EDP or Enterprise Data Protection also applies here How can I access Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat? Today, Copilot Chat is accessible via https://m365.cloud.microsoft or https://copilot.cloud.microsoft using your Entra ID (work or school account). One important difference in day-to-day experience: Users with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license typically see Copilot prominently surfaced across Microsoft 365 apps. Users with Copilot Chat only may not see it pinned by default on the Microsoft 365 home page. To improve discoverability, Microsoft 365 Copilot administrators can pin Copilot Chat via the Microsoft 365 admin center, ensuring that users can easily access it without friction. Especially convenient is that if you use the M365 Copilot Chat app on Windows, you can open Copilot using the keyboard shortcut Ctrl + C. What’s the difference? The differences between Copilot Chat and Microsoft 365 Copilot mainly come down to: Licensing Data grounding (web-only vs. personal work data) Integration depth within Microsoft 365 apps I’ve listed the key differences in the comparison below. 👇
Using Copilot meeting summaries for performance reviews - how?
Our HR team had this idea to use Copilot meeting recaps as input for performance reviews. Like, if a manager had 20 meetings with a direct report over the quarter, couldnt Copilot help surface key contributions and discussion themes? The problem is theres no way to aggregate multiple meeting summaries into something useful for a review. Each recap is a separate thing in each meeting. Has anyone figured out a workflow or workaround for this?
Copilot pulling last weeks 1:1 action items into this weeks agenda, possible?
Spent 3 hours yesterday trying to get Copilot to pull open action items from last weeks 1:1 OneNote page and turn them into this weeks agenda. Gave up. Is this a prompt problem or just not possible with the current connectors?
Automating the feedback collection process before reviews. Is it possible with Copilot?
Every quarter, our HR team manually emails people asking for peer feedback before reviews start. Its a huge time sink and half the responses come in late. Someone mentioned Copilot agents might be able to handle this, like automatically reaching out to the right people, collecting responses, and organizing them. Has anyone tried building something like this? Or is there a simpler way to automate 360 feedback collection in M365?
