Microsoft Copilot is continuing to make steps forward in 2026. Here’s a quick overview of the 4 most importants new features:
GPT-5.2 is now powering Copilot
Copilot now runs on GPT-5.2, which brings a clear improvement in how it reasons. You can tell if your Copilot is already powered by GPT-5.2 by the Auto dropdown button in the upper right corner (Available options are: Auto (default), Quick Response, Think Deeper)
In default mode, Copilot assesses the question and decides to give a quick answer from ‘memory’ or if it needs to think and plan before it answers. In this case, it creates an internal plan, structures its approach, and then responds. This makes complex questions, multi-step tasks, and analysis noticeably more reliable.
Early personalization (Frontier only)
I’ll be honest this is one of my own personal favorite features of ChatGPT and it’s being introduced in Microsoft Copilot; Personalization is being introduced in Copilot, very similar to what users already know from ChatGPT (for now only in Frontier.)
This means Copilot can start adapting to:
your preferences
your interaction style
recurring patterns in how you work
This is still limited and evolving. However, this is important, responses of models are very dependent on the context that is provided to them. By having your context handy, responses becomes more fit to your needs (better)
Claude models enter Copilot
Claude is no longer limited to research scenarios. It can now also be used inside Copilot .
A few important points:
Claude is disabled by default
you need to be mindful of data protection; Claude models are not hosted in your Microsoft tenancy (but on AWS) , so you data leaves Microsoft
it is not connected to your Microsoft 365 work data (M365 Graph)
A growing ecosystem of agents
Copilot is increasingly becoming an agent platform, not just a chat interface. Microsoft added recently a bunch of new default agents (Sales Development Agent, App Builder Agent, Workflows Agent, People Agent, Learning Agents, …)
One notable addition is People Agents, which help with:
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finding the right people in the context of meetings
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understanding reporting structures
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navigating organisations more efficiently
And this is just the start — more agent types are clearly on the way.
