Forms Surveys agent retires as Copilot experiences expand across Teams, the Microsoft 365 Copilot app, and Copilot Studio.

Microsoft is retiring the Surveys agent and moving customers to a unified Copilot-powered experience inside Microsoft Forms. Users will create, collect, and analyze in Forms rather than relying on the standalone agent. IT should prepare communications and update any guidance that references the Surveys agent before removal.

• Retirement completion (removal from Agent Store): August 31, 2026
• No additional licensing required for the integrated Copilot-powered experience (per post)

Copilot Chat is being added as a side-by-side experience in Teams, accessible from the Copilot icon across chats, channels, calling, and meetings. This expands how users can access M365 and web-grounded Copilot experiences directly within Teams. Review user readiness and support documentation for the new entry point and in-meeting behavior updates.

• Available on Teams desktop (Windows/Mac) and web
• Message includes an updated timeline and a new in-meeting sub-feature description

Microsoft is updating M365 Copilot and Copilot Chat usage reports to refresh faster and organize reporting more clearly. More usage metrics will also be available through Microsoft Graph APIs to support custom dashboards and reporting. Admins and BI teams should review any reporting integrations and update queries once the new metrics appear.

• GA rollout starts mid-July 2026
• Expanded programmatic access to Copilot usage metrics via Graph API

Copilot Studio will support exporting agent execution telemetry at the environment level to Azure Application Insights. This enables centralized monitoring, custom dashboards, and alerting in Azure Monitor for agent activity. Admins should plan governance for enabling exports and ensure Application Insights workspaces and retention policies are ready.

• Public preview begins July 15, 2026
• Telemetry exported in OpenTelemetry-aligned span format

Copilot Studio will add enforcement to prevent agents and flows from being shared when they rely on unsafe identities (for example maker/system credentials). This reduces risk of identity leakage and privilege escalation during design, publish, and sharing. Admins should review current maker practices and be ready for the new enforcement behavior in preview.

• Public preview starts July 24, 2026
• Applies across design, publish, and share stages

The built-in taskbar pinning control in the Microsoft 365 admin center will focus only on pinning the Microsoft 365 Copilot app. Companion apps (Files, Calendar, People) will no longer be pinned via this control. If your organization requires companion apps pinned, plan to use Microsoft Intune taskbar policies instead.

• Reduces unintended companion app pinning
• Intune remains the supported approach for companion app pinning

Microsoft 365 Copilot Notebooks will support additional text-based reference sources, including TXT, RTF, and Markdown files. This improves grounding using runbooks, README files, transcripts, and other documentation without conversions. Support teams should update enablement guidance for teams using Notebooks for knowledge work.

• TXT/RTF support begins rolling out early July 2026
• Markdown (.md) support expands grounding sources for technical documentation

The Microsoft 365 Copilot app is getting an updated Notebooks experience to keep chats, generated content, and reference materials organized in a persistent workspace. This helps users continue project work across conversations while staying in context. No change is made to the existing Notebooks experience in OneNote.

• Brings lightweight project workspaces to the Copilot app
• OneNote Notebooks experience remains unchanged

The Web content (web search grounding) preference is expanding beyond the Work tab and will be accessible in Settings. Users of Microsoft 365 Copilot and Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat will be able to control web content grounding across supported Copilot experiences with a persistent preference. Admins should review user guidance and any policies that depend on web grounding behavior.

• Preference follows the user across supported Copilot experiences
• Applies to both Microsoft 365 Copilot and Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat users

SharePoint pages can now include buttons that launch a predefined prompt in Copilot for SharePoint (for licensed users) or trigger a Power Automate flow. This enables guided AI actions and workflow automation directly from intranet pages. SharePoint owners should review page designs and governance for prompting and flow-trigger buttons.

• Targeted Release starts late July 2026
• Supports Copilot for SharePoint prompts and Power Automate flow initiation

Microsoft Planner is now accessible directly in Outlook (web and new Outlook for Windows) and within the Microsoft 365 Copilot app. This reduces context switching by letting users manage tasks alongside email, calendar, and Copilot. IT should update user adoption materials and validate the experience for relevant client configurations.

• Available in Outlook web and the new Outlook for Windows
• Also available inside the Microsoft 365 Copilot app