Copilot Frontier Map

Most Frontier features are included in your existing Microsoft 365 Copilot per-user licence at no extra usage cost. The exceptions are the deeply agentic, long-running features: Copilot Cowork and Microsoft Scout both use usage-based (consumption) billing via Copilot Credits, where admins can set per-user or per-group limits in the Microsoft 365 admin centre. A few capabilities need a separate paid SKU (Microsoft Agent 365 is per-user; Copilot Studio has its own licensing with consumption-based message capacity), and some are included but depend on another licence you may already pay for (Call Delegation and customer call answering need Teams Phone; Opal runs on a Windows 365 Cloud PC; Power BI and Dataverse features use your existing data licensing). Each feature card shows a Billing line and a badge so you can see this at a glance — use the '💳 consumption' pulse filter to list just the metered ones.

It can. The clearest precedent is Copilot Cowork, which was free to try under Frontier and moved to usage-based Copilot Credits billing when it became generally available in June 2026. Microsoft has not published a blanket list of which Frontier features will become consumption-billed, but the pattern is that autonomous, agentic features (that plan and act over long-running tasks) are the ones most likely to carry consumption costs at GA. Features that are simple in-app Copilot assists have so far stayed included in the Copilot licence. Watch the Billing badge on each card — we update it as Microsoft confirms pricing.

The Frontier programme is Microsoft's opt-in early-access programme that lets organisations trial experimental and upcoming Copilot AI capabilities before general availability. Features in Frontier are production-quality but may evolve, change, or be withdrawn based on real-world feedback. Tenant admins enable it via the Microsoft 365 Admin Centre.

Go to the Microsoft 365 Admin Centre → Settings → Org settings → Copilot → Frontier programme. An admin must explicitly opt in. Some features (like Copilot Cowork) also require approving Anthropic as a sub-processor.

In 2026, Microsoft introduced three release tiers for Copilot features. Frontier gives early access to experimental features. Standard is the default — features arrive at GA automatically. Deferred lets organisations delay new features by ~30 days after GA for internal testing and change management.

No. Some Frontier features have additional requirements — for example, Copilot Cowork requires approving Anthropic as a sub-processor, and Call Delegation requires a Teams Phone licence. Each feature may also roll out in stages across tenants.

Not necessarily. Microsoft explicitly states that Frontier features can change, pause, or be withdrawn. GA timing is never guaranteed. However, most Frontier features do eventually graduate to GA — examples include Scheduled Prompting and Copilot Notebooks enhancements.

Features using Anthropic Claude (like Copilot Cowork and multi-model Researcher) require data to cross to Anthropic's infrastructure, which is excluded from the EU Data Boundary. EU/EFTA/UK tenants must explicitly opt in to Anthropic as a sub-processor — it's disabled by default in these regions.

We verify all features against public Microsoft sources regularly. Each feature card shows a 'last verified' date. When Microsoft announces changes — new Frontier features, GA graduations, or withdrawals — we update within days.

Every feature on this page is sourced from public Microsoft documentation — official blog posts, the Frontier features page, and the Microsoft 365 Roadmap. We do not include internal or unconfirmed information. Each feature links to its public source.