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Posted on Sep 29 Originally published at getpack.fr

The new Microsoft Copilot: Home, Code and Autopilot explained

#ai #githubcopilot #microsoft #students

First published in GetPack Magazine, sourced guides to use AI well as a student.

On September 25, 2026, Microsoft unveiled the biggest overhaul of Copilot since it launched: three spaces called Home, Code and Autopilot. Under the launch vocabulary sits a billing change that says more than the rest of the announcement. Here is what was announced, what you can actually use today, and what it means if you use Copilot through your school or university account.

In short: in a post signed by Jared Spataro, Chief Marketing Officer, AI at Work, Microsoft reorganizes Copilot around three spaces. Home brings chat and delegated work together, with Word, Excel and PowerPoint built right into Copilot. Code lets you describe a small app in plain language, on the same technology as GitHub Copilot. Autopilot, previously called Scout, is an agent that keeps working without being prompted. Above all, the business model splits in two: the per-user license covers chat and the Office apps, while everything agent-based moves to usage-based billing, paid in Copilot Credits.

What Microsoft announced on September 25, 2026

The announcement appeared on the official Microsoft blog, signed by Jared Spataro. It does not introduce a new language model. It reorganizes the interface and the way Copilot is sold.

The rollout is gradual. Home and Code will start reaching users "in the coming weeks" through the Microsoft Frontier program. Autopilot expands to a private preview at the end of the month. A preview of Code is promised later this year for Microsoft 365 Premium and Pro subscribers. Microsoft Source EMEA also mentions features still to come, such as Today in Home and @copilot in Teams.

Put plainly: as of September 28, 2026, almost none of this is open to the general public, let alone switched on by default at a school or university.

Home: chat and delegated work in one place

Home becomes the starting point of the Copilot app. It merges two modes that used to live apart: Chat, where you ask a question and get an answer, and Cowork, where you hand over a whole task and come back later.

The most tangible change is Office inside Copilot. Word, Excel and PowerPoint open directly in the Copilot interface. You can ask for a document to be created or edited without switching apps, and the file stays editable and in sync with the matching Office app. Microsoft's pitch, as the Blog du Modérateur also reports it: "no broken formatting, no stray versions, no rebuilding the context in another app." It is the least flashy part of the announcement, and probably the most useful day to day.

Code: describe a small app instead of writing it

Code is aimed at people who don't program. According to Techzine, any employee can describe an app, a tracker, a dashboard or a workflow in natural language. Microsoft's post says the result runs in a sandboxed environment, can be hosted securely inside the organization's tenant, and is built on the same technology as GitHub Copilot.

Jared Spataro goes as far as writing that learning to build these small tools "is becoming as basic a skill as writing a memo."

This is the vibe coding promise, dropped into the most widely used office suite in the world. It hits the same wall as always: describing what you want, precisely, is still the hard part. A vague request produces a vague dashboard. The time well spent goes into the specification, not into re-rolling the prompt.

Autopilot: an agent that keeps going when you step away

Autopilot is the genuinely new piece. Previously known as Scout, it is a persistent agent. You give it a name, a role and a goal, and from then on it works without being nudged. Microsoft's post says it "goes to work": it watches channels, follows up on threads and runs recurring tasks. Microsoft also says it has its own identity, its own memory, its own computer and its own workspace inside the tenant.

Microsoft adds that it shows up where people already work, Teams and Outlook included, so you can @mention it like a colleague, within the organization's permissions and governance rules. Techzine and the Blog du Modérateur report the same.

This is a change in kind, not in degree. A chatbot answers when you ask. A persistent agent acts while you do something else, with its own entry in the directory. The question is no longer "is the answer right?" but "what did it do while I wasn't looking?"

The real change is in the billing: the license on one side, credits on the other

This is the point the announcement doesn't lead with, and the one that will matter most. Microsoft now separates two billing regimes:

the per-user license (User Subscription License) covers chat and Copilot in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and Teams, at a fixed cost;
usage-based billing covers agentic work: Cowork, Code, Autopilot and the most advanced models. The unit is the Copilot Credit.

The admin documentation on Microsoft Learn, updated on September 25, 2026, defines Copilot Credits as "a common currency for eligible Microsoft services with usage-based billing." One detail worth noticing: on that date, the official list of services billed in credits still only includes Cowork, apps built with Cowork and the Work IQ API. Code and Autopilot will join a mechanism that is already running.

On the organization's side, that mechanism is run from a cost management dashboard: spending policies by group, an overall monthly cap, a per-user cap, alerts, and credit requests that an admin approves. Microsoft explicitly recommends setting a per-user limit so that a single person can't burn through the whole budget. In Cowork, typing /cost shows the approximate credit cost of the open task.

Keep the logic in mind. Asking a question costs a subscription. Delegating a task costs whatever it consumes, and the amount depends on what the agent does. A tool whose cost varies with use is a tool that ends up rationed.

What you actually get in your school's Copilot

None of the above lands automatically in a student account. The Microsoft Frontier program, through which Home and Code start rolling out, is managed at the tenant level: your institution's IT admin decides whether to turn it on, and for whom. The Microsoft documentation is clear: joining Frontier requires a Microsoft Copilot license, and "users without a Microsoft Copilot license aren't presented with Frontier features." These features are previews that may be modified, suspended or discontinued.

What you probably already have, on the other hand, is better suited to studying. According to the Microsoft 365 Education documentation, Copilot Chat is available by default to adult learners, higher education students included, with an Education A1, A3 or A5 license. In K-12 tenants, meaning schools, it is off by default for students aged 13 to 17 and an admin has to enable it. Students under 13 can't access it.

On top of that chat, Microsoft offers the Study and Learn agent, included at no extra cost with A1, A3 and A5 licenses, for ages 13 and up, as long as Copilot Chat is enabled. Microsoft sums up the idea this way: "the learner does the thinking, and the agent coaches them through the process." In the launch post of July 28, 2026, Mark Sparvell, a director at Microsoft Education, describes the same principle: flashcards, quizzes, step-by-step support that encourages problem solving, and questions back on an assignment rather than a finished text.

In other words, the headline feature is an agent that works in your place, and the feature already sitting in your student account is designed not to.

Handing graded work to an agent: the line not to cross

A persistent agent changes what cheating looks like. It is no longer about pasting a copied answer. It is about handing over a goal, not watching the process, and turning in the result. Three habits are worth setting now.

The draft stays your work. An agent can gather sources, prepare a table, check a line of reasoning. It should not write the text you sign. One simple test settles it: could you defend every sentence out loud?

You answer for what the agent does. It works with the access your organization grants it. Even when it has its own identity in the directory, like Autopilot, you set its goal, and you hand in the result under your name.

Check the rules before, not after. AI policies differ from one institution to the next, and many now distinguish a chat tool from an autonomous agent. That is the only way to know what is allowed on graded work.

Our take

The September 25 announcement is less a technical breakthrough than a change of business model. Microsoft stops selling an assistant bundled into a subscription and starts selling work by the task, measured in credits. That makes sense: an agent that runs for hours doesn't cost the same as a question in a chat window.

For a student, the effect is twofold. In the short term, almost nothing changes: Home, Code and Autopilot first go through an admin decision and a paid license. In the medium term, the gap widens between what a school account allows and what a colleague at a company will do with a credit budget. The skill that gains value is not launching an agent. It is specifying what you ask of it and checking what it did.

One last point of method, which goes beyond Microsoft: when an announcement mixes available features, private previews and promises for "later this year," the only reliable information is the admin documentation. That is where you find out what really exists, and at what price.

FAQ

Can I use Home, Code and Autopilot with my student account?

Very likely not today. Home and Code roll out through the Microsoft Frontier program, which requires a Microsoft Copilot license and has to be turned on by your institution's IT admin. Autopilot is in private preview. Without a Microsoft Copilot license, these features aren't offered.

What is the difference between Copilot Chat and Cowork?

Chat answers a question you ask in the conversation. Cowork carries out a delegated task while you do something else. In the new Copilot, both live in Home, but they aren't billed the same way: Chat falls under the per-user license, Cowork under usage-based billing in Copilot Credits.

What exactly is a Copilot Credit?

Microsoft Learn defines it as a common currency for services with usage-based billing. It is not a message quota: consumption depends on what the agent does. Admins set monthly caps for the organization and per user, and the /cost command in Cowork shows the approximate cost of the current task.

Can I use Study and Learn to revise?

Yes, if your institution has it switched on. It comes at no extra cost with Microsoft 365 Education A1, A3 and A5 licenses, for ages 13 and up, and requires Copilot Chat to be enabled. It is built to make you think rather than to hand you finished answers. As with any AI tool, check your institution's AI policy before using it on graded work.

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