Introduction to Microsoft 365 Copilot
Introduction to Microsoft 365 Copilot
What Microsoft 365 Copilot is
An AI assistant built into the Microsoft 365 apps. It understands plain language, writes, summarizes, analyzes and – most importantly – works with your work data: e-mails, meetings, chats and documents.
graph LR
P["Your prompt"] --> C["Copilot"]
C --> G["Work IQ / Microsoft Graph<br/>mail, calendar, Teams, files"]
C --> W["Web<br/>(if enabled)"]
G --> M["Language model"]
W --> M
M --> O["Answer with citations"]
Copilot Chat vs. Microsoft 365 Copilot
| Copilot Chat (free with M365) | Microsoft 365 Copilot (paid licence) | |
|---|---|---|
| Web | ✔ | ✔ |
| Your mail, calendar, Teams, files | ✖ (only a file you upload) | ✔ |
| Copilot in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams | limited | ✔ full |
| Teams meeting recap | ✖ | ✔ |
| Researcher, Analyst, Notebooks | ✖ / limited | ✔ |
Where to find Copilot
- Microsoft 365 Copilot app (m365copilot.com, Teams, Windows) – chat over all your data
- Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Teams, OneNote – Copilot button on the ribbon or in the window
- Work / Web toggle (Work IQ) – decides whether Copilot searches your company data
Security and trust
- Copilot only sees what you already have access to – permissions are respected.
- Company data is not used to train the models and stays within the Microsoft 365 boundary.
- Copilot can be wrong: always check numbers, names and dates (citations help).
- You are responsible for what you send.
The 3 C rule
Check the facts – Correct the tone – Confirm, then send.