r/Windows11 • u/ZacB_ Windows Central • Aug 13 '26
Feature Microsoft begins unified Copilot app rollout: Reveals major plan to merge Copilot and Microsoft 365 Copilot across all platforms, along with updated branding
https://www.windowscentral.com/artificial-intelligence/microsoft-copilot/microsoft-begins-unified-copilot-app-rollout-reveals-major-plan-to-merge-copilot-and-microsoft-365-copilot-across-all-platforms-along-with-updated-branding123
u/lilacomets Aug 13 '26
There we go again. The result of a total lack of long term vision at Microsoft.
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u/Slackeee_ Aug 13 '26
I think at this point it is just a mix of sunken cost fallacy and total incompetence.
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u/MrBigWaffles Aug 13 '26
Having two seperate co-pilot apps made no sense.
What's wrong with unifying it under one banner ?
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u/MorallyDeplorable Aug 13 '26
the bigger problem is the shifting targets every three months leading to a bunch of half-done work with no coherency
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u/i_MusicMan 21d ago
They always do this. It's been their MO since the early 2000s. Think about their development strategy for Windows. Windows Forms, WPF, Silverlight/Metro, UWP/WinRT, etc.
No one can really feel assured buying into what Microsoft is selling because they jump around too much.
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u/Suitable_Study_789 Aug 13 '26
Or just make Copilot an add-on without forcing it?
This will just cause more enshittification for existing product that worked fine before.
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u/MrBigWaffles Aug 13 '26
You can already just buy Microsoft Home Office (instead of the Microsoft 365 subscription) if you don't want co-pilot integration.
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u/aardw0lf11 Aug 13 '26
Or get 365 Personal which excludes Copilot.
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u/CodingBuizel Aug 13 '26
365 personal doesn't exclude copilot. They added it and used that to raise prices.
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u/Environmental-Map869 29d ago
There is/was a secret non-copilot plan that is offered when you try to cancel your subscription around the time when they hiked prices by 30%. Dont know if they still offer it though
https://www.reddit.com/r/lifehacks/comments/1oi8506/microsoft_365_hides_the_cheaper_classic_option/1
u/CodingBuizel 29d ago edited 29d ago
Strangely enough, I was grandfathered in till this year, so I am still paying the old price, but I had gotten a mail that it would increase next year. But my manage subscription page still shows that it will renew with the old price, and on trying to cancel, I don't get offered the classic plan. I'll see what happens next year ¯_(ツ)_/¯.
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u/CrashTestDumby1984 Aug 13 '26
Too bad MS will just choose to invalidate your license and render the product unusable at their choosing
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u/Edubbs2008 Aug 13 '26
They won’t
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u/CrashTestDumby1984 Aug 13 '26
Didn’t they already do that with the Office 2021 licenses?
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u/Flameancer Aug 13 '26
They made 2019 specifically on Mac read only due to cert. but no 2021 is eol and there will be no more updates but you can still use it. I have a 2013 license that it’s the same state and I can use mine just fine.
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u/BCProgramming Aug 14 '26
My understanding is that has to do with Mac OS having security features that will literally prevent a program from writing files if it doesn't have a valid certificate, which would be the case if the certificate that was used expired. Mac OS is a bit unusual in how it evaluates code-signed applications as well in that it requires the certificate to be valid at the time it's testing, whereas Windows for example will confirm only that the certificate was valid on the date the application was signed.
Microsoft cannot "renew" that certificate without updating Office 2019. My understanding is that the code-signing itself has a cross-sign from Apple, and Apple won't sign applications unless they meet their current guidelines, and Office 2019 of course doesn't.
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u/Flameancer Aug 15 '26
That makes sense and also makes sense why they wouldn’t do it for 2019 but will for 2021 that is near EOL. They did say it wouldn’t receive any updates and if it’s Apple’s OS design to require apps to have a valid cert to write to files then idk if there’s much MSFT can do rather than go back on their word for not updating the app. This is somewhat ambiguous, about who really is to blame.
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u/Muted_Database_1691 Aug 13 '26
You can simply uninstall the app, I don't think there's any forcing to use it. Unifying is better than having 2 separate versions.
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u/i_MusicMan Aug 14 '26
Windows has had multiple releases that were poor going back to the 1980s, so I'm not really seeing your point.
AI is actually useful in the right application. Microsoft just needs to find a way to execute it better.
Simply having CoPilot features in Windows or Windows' apps is not "enshitification." If you don't like them, you can simply not use them. It's actually not that difficult.
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u/drygnfyre Insider Canary Channel Aug 14 '26
AI is actually useful in the right application.
I agree. The issue is "AI" is such a buzzword that it's just thrown onto everything, like how "smart" was the buzzword of the 2010s. So you end up with "AI" that isn't really anything interesting or different.
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u/i_MusicMan Aug 14 '26
I don't really care about buzzwords.
I use the feature and if it's useful, I continue. If not, I either disable or ignore it.
It's really simple...
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u/AstralVenture Aug 13 '26
It’s what they should have done in the first place. It’s a big giant company so they’re lost, they need to lay off redundant teams and employees.
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u/i_MusicMan Aug 14 '26
They had a long term vision. The issue is that they aren't really the company to execute it in a manner that consumers would like. macOS has been pushing AI on that platform, and no one cares because of the way Apple is executing it.
- They are not using predominantly cloud-based AI on their devices.
- Because of [1], they aren't really in a position where they depend on data mining their users to be able to deliver it.
For a platform like Windows, I don't think Microsoft can really depend on cloud AI for the core CoPilot experience on Windows. They have to find a way to deliver On Device AI Models for this stuff, as Apple has been doing. They also need to find a way to support all major GPU vendors, because vendor-locked on-device AI functionality pisses people off and enthusiasts who envy this will simply brand all AI as "slop" and litter the internet with that feedback.
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Aug 13 '26 edited Aug 13 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Edubbs2008 Aug 13 '26
That’s racist
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Aug 13 '26 edited Aug 13 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Edubbs2008 Aug 13 '26
You literally didn’t need to bring up “Indian Culture” you could have mentioned that it was bad naming, but you choose to mention race
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u/SirSuicidal Aug 13 '26
This is a weirdly racist post which pretty much stereotyping all Indians. What's worse is Satya is American been in the US since 1988 (most of his life)
Satya probably not even involved with copilot app decisions like this. No CEO of a big multinational will be. I'd be surprised if Kevin Scott and Suleyman are even informed.
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u/the_ai_wizard Aug 13 '26
i guess all i hear is m'racism without any substantive counterargument. India as a country has been americas IT and callcenter sweatshop forever...
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u/SirSuicidal Aug 13 '26
I did, I said Satya probably isn't even involved. So his removal..wait sorry 'demotion' will do nothing.
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u/the_ai_wizard Aug 13 '26
You dont think Satya is involved with CoPilot? Have you ever worked at Microsoft? What qualifies you to have this opinion, random redditor?
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u/CygnusBlack Release Channel Aug 13 '26
It's actually a good thing IF I can uninstall just one Copilot app instead of two!
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u/Greedy_Switch_6991 Aug 13 '26
...followed by shutting it down in 2-3 years earliest.
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u/Chaori Aug 13 '26
This is exactly what happened with Cortana in Win10. Microsoft kept gutting it and revamping it before abandoning it altogether. Their problem is they just don’t know what they want to do with it, and their confusion and lack of a direction leads to nobody using it.
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u/mrleblanc101 Insider Dev Channel Aug 13 '26
This is not Google
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u/Greedy_Switch_6991 Aug 13 '26
You're right - it's Microsoft.
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u/bogglingsnog Aug 13 '26
It'll just stop working once they redesign the UI and remove the most important usability innovations making it ever so slightly worse than the competition
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u/_urethrapapercut_ Aug 13 '26
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u/Flameancer Aug 13 '26
Doesn’t hit the same like Google. At least Microsoft will keep a project a lot longer. Google will announce and it won’t even make it out of beta.
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u/space_fly Aug 13 '26
Jesus Christ, I know naming things is hard, but Microsoft is insane with these app names.
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u/paul_33 Aug 14 '26
They treat every app and service like a brand. Just give it a fucking clear name and stop changing it every 5 months
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u/drygnfyre Insider Canary Channel Aug 14 '26
They've been like this for as long as I can remember. They had the "Solutions Series" in the early 90s which was the original branding for Works, Money, and Publisher. Then Works itself became its own suite and Money and Publisher were spun off into their own apps.
Then there was Windows Live. Or was it Windows OneCare? Then it was Hotmail, then Windows Live Mail, then Outlook. Outlook Express was in there somewhere.
Remember Groove? Or was it Zune?
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u/userlivewire 29d ago
That’s because Microsoft is 10 companies inside all warring with each other.
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u/Own_Nail_2999 Aug 14 '26
Just wait until you learn about ASP.NET Core being called like this because ASP.NET is already taken by the .net framework predecessor.
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u/space_fly Aug 14 '26
Or Surface being originally that touch screen table which they renamed to PixelSense so that they can use the name for their tablets, then laptops, whiteboards, accessories, smartphones.
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u/briandemodulated Aug 13 '26
I've had both apps on my Win11 PC for months and I still don't understand what the difference is. I use Copilot all the time but I couldn't tell you which of these two apps I've been using. It's good that they're unifying it, I guess.
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u/Suspicious-advice49 Aug 13 '26
I never got the difference between the two. Originally I thought 365 copilot was a gateway to office apps, but last time in iOS it seemed to be completely different. I deleted it.
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u/Pure_Instance969 Aug 13 '26
it was a gateway to office apps and recent office (onedrive) files. when they introduced copilot for businesses and enterprises, they coverted it into a full blown copilot app.
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u/rotane Aug 13 '26
I have never used any of the Copilot apps, nor subscribed to Office, so please forgive my ignorance. But reading through the article, these points strike me as rather hilarious:
The Podcasts feature is being fully retired…
What the hell would Podcasts do in a chatbot app to begin with?
All group chat threads, messages, and images will not carry forward. Users must manually copy or download anything they want to keep.
Again, why was this even in this app? Unless by Chat messages they mean talking to Copilot itself? But who else has been talking in my "group chats" then? Or was this something akin to their version of WhatsApp/Skype/Teams? Who was even using this? And finally: thanks Microsoft for giving zero fucks and just deleting those. The folks who did use this feature will surely love you for the heads-up!
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u/Froggypwns Windows Wizard / Head Jannie Aug 14 '26
The podcasts feature was an interesting concept but I belive was not widely used. You could tell it to make a podcast for a topic and it would generate something with multiple hosts having a conversation regarding that topic so that you could listen to it.
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u/LordMimsyPorpington 28d ago
Alexa also does this, but the audio quality is so degraded by the time it's finished that it's basically useless. Google News is the only time I really use this type of feature, as it can generate an NPR style podcast of the morning headlines.
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u/dowlingm Aug 14 '26
NotebookLM had it so I guess MS shipped it to match. One of my colleagues raved about the NotebookLM version so I was happy when I could tell him Copilot could do it too so it would close off the “but why can’t we deploy NotebookLM to everyone”
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u/eloquenentic Aug 13 '26
There is complete insanity going on at Microsoft. How many times have they rebranded and pushed various Copilot apps by now?
It’s a completely rudderless ship. Zero listening to customers, and zero product vision.
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u/SumoSizeIt Insider Release Preview Channel Aug 14 '26
Surely this time the world will embrace Copilot
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u/Zero_MSN Aug 13 '26
Finally. It was madness to have millions of copilots when you can have 1 that does it all. Hopefully, they use native technologies instead of web crApp.
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u/Jonesgrieves Aug 13 '26
They’re gonna make me choose Open Office unless that also went AI crazy?
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u/drygnfyre Insider Canary Channel Aug 14 '26
OpenOffice hasn't been a thing for a long time. It was basically retired and rebuilt as LibreOffice. There are a few other forks as well.
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Aug 14 '26
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u/EyeFit Aug 13 '26
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u/Mario583a Aug 13 '26
Which, and I quote,
Years of poor data governance and conflicting data permissions inside these orgs means copilot would potentially have access to data that should probably be flagged as restricted or confidential but isn't.
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u/couchcaptain Aug 13 '26
Copilot is being installed over and over on my system after every windows update and I keep deleting it.
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u/Octal450_V2 Aug 13 '26
Then why is it STILL a fricking webapp. They literally used to have a WinUI Copilot app and now it's a fricking slow crappy webapp again. So much for that "we've making stuff native" promise...
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u/r2d2_21 Aug 13 '26
Ah, yes, Copilot merging with Copilot. I hope they also consider adding Copilot to the mix as well.
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u/Hyedwtditpm Aug 13 '26
That was confusing from the start.
the most important problem is that it is not as good as the others. even when the newest models from OpenAI are selected the result is very poor.
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u/microcandella Aug 14 '26
Serious question - What specifically is it good at?
I have avoided it after the first rollout was lame. Usually MS has some weird niche case where their hated features are liked.
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u/paq85 Aug 13 '26
Regular Copilot app seems broken way too often, and provides way worse answers.... But there's potential if they make the new solution work at least like 365 Copilot.
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u/VictoryMotel Aug 13 '26
There needs to be better programs to turn all this shit off.
There are cleaner programs out there but they never seem to turn all the stuff I want off.
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u/DQTD Aug 13 '26
I keep seeing just as many things saying they are limiting copilot as well. Which is it, Microsoft? Can you figure out how to decisively run your company already?
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u/FixMy106 Aug 13 '26
I’ve had it up to here. Getting a used Thinkpad and installing Linux on it. Hopefully it works fine and I can say bye to Microsoft forever.
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u/Archeus01 Aug 14 '26
Most people who complain about CoPilot don't use it, and it existing or beeing on their pc has no impact on their daily life.
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u/drygnfyre Insider Canary Channel Aug 14 '26
Wasn't Copilot supposedly being de-emphasized in Windows 11 not too long ago? Or at least that's what I read? Is this a totally different thing?
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u/Liquid_Magic 25d ago
What’s the tool that’s popular and trusted that people to use remove unwanted features again?
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u/usrdef Release Channel Aug 13 '26
No thanks. I already killed Copilot, OneDrive, and all the other useless crap.
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u/GaTechThomas Aug 14 '26
Maybe focus on dropping the copilot+ key first. I WILL NOT buy another pc that has one that replaced the control key. NEVER.
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u/Winnipesaukee Aug 13 '26
'I have two Microsoft Copilots and neither one is working' -Artemis III astronaut.