Microsoft Copilot Pro launches for power AI users — here’s what it offers

Microsoft today announced the launch of Copilot Pro, a premium tier of its Copilot AI companion that gives individual users enhanced AI capabilities to use and play with.

Available starting today for $20 per user per month, Copilot Pro provides users with priority access to the latest GPT models from OpenAI during peak times as well as improved features, such as faster image generation, and a dedicated Copilot GPT Builder (coming soon). 

“Our goal is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more by bringing Copilot, the everyday AI companion, to millions of people around the world. We have reached another milestone in this mission with more than 5 billion chats and more than 5 billion images to date,” Yusuf Mehdi, executive vice president and consumer chief marketing officer at Microsoft wrote in a blog post.

He also announced that the Copilot app is now generally available for both Android and iOS devices.

What does Microsoft Copilot Pro help with?

While Microsoft has been offering a free version of Copilot for consumers and a paid one for businesses for a while, the Satya Nadella-led company found one particular group wasn’t fully served: individual power users. Folks such as developers, designers, or researchers needed to do more with the AI companion – but not at the scale of a business.

To help support these use cases, Microsoft has launched the Pro version of the assistant that brings everything Copilot has on offer with accelerated performance and improved capabilities.

According to the company, users signing up for this subscription can expect a single unified Copilot experience that runs not just across platforms – from the web to PC to phone – but also across Microsoft 365 Personal and Family apps to understand relevant contexts and deliver what’s needed. 

This covers everything Microsoft has on offer, including Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and Outlook. Imagine being able to draft your document from text prompts, getting email summaries within Outlook, or generating entire presentations just by engaging in a conversational experience with PowerPoint.

More importantly, while Copilot gives access to OpenAI’s GPT-4 and GPT-4 Turbo only during non-peak times, the Pro version will provide priority access to the models all the time, including during peak times, to get things done faster. The company said it is also working on the ability to toggle between models to help users optimize their experience.

For creators and designers, Microsoft said, the Pro version of the Copilot will help with faster image generation while providing detailed image quality as well as the option of landscape format. The offering will tap OpenAI’s image generation AI model DALL-E 3 to allow users to create images and come with 100 boosts per day, unlike the 15 boosts/day of the standard Copilot, to ensure faster generation.

Ability to build GPTs and more

Tapping on OpenAI’s recent announcement of GPT Builder, Microsoft has also introduced a GPT Builder for Copilot Pro.

This, much like the OpenAI offering, will allow users to build a customized Copilot tailored for a specific topic – with just a simple set of prompts.

“A handful of Copilot GPTs will start to roll out beginning today with specific purposes such as fitness, travel, cooking and more. Soon, Copilot Pro users will also be able to create their own Copilot GPTs using Copilot GPT Builder,” Mehdi wrote without sharing when exactly the builder will launch.

Finally, Mehdi also shared some incremental improvements, including the general availability of the Copilot app on Android and iOS devices, as well as the removal of the 300-seat purchase minimum for organizations looking to use Copilot for Microsoft 365.

This means small businesses with Business Premium and Business Standard plans can start using Copilot for Microsoft 365 by choosing any number of seats under 300. The price here is kept at $30 per person per month. 

Upgrade or downgrade?

The approach of adding a Pro tier to Copilot shows that while Microsoft wants to bring its AI companion front and center, it does not want to miss any chance of making money from it. 

Many users on X (formerly Twitter) pointed out that the company previously offered free, unrestricted access to GPT-4 and GPT-4 Turbo models, but now, with the new paid tier in play, that’s going to change, with non-paying users getting access to the models only during non-peak hours. 

While this makes sense from the business perspective, it may be a roadblock for many users who have been relying on copilot for their day-to-day work. It remains to be seen whether they will choose to transition to the Pro version to keep doing their work or stick with the version with limits.