Managing Your Copilot Conversations
Copilot conversations pile up fast. Learn how to find previous chats, rename them for easy searching, delete what you don't need, and save important insights to notebooks.
Why conversation management matters
Think of Copilot conversations like browser tabs.
You start a chat for a quick question, then another for a report, then another to draft an email. Before you know it, you have 40 conversations and can’t find anything.
Good conversation management is like keeping a tidy desk: rename important chats so you can find them, delete ones you don’t need, and save to notebooks when you want to keep insights for later.
Finding previous conversations
Copilot keeps your recent conversations in a sidebar panel. You can:
- Browse the list (most recent first)
- Search by keyword to find a specific conversation
- Scroll back through older chats
Where to find them: In Copilot Chat (web, Teams, or M365 app) → look for the chat history panel on the left side. In some views, click the history icon to reveal it.
Renaming a chat
By default, Copilot names conversations based on your first prompt. This often isn’t very helpful — “Tell me about the budget” could be any of a dozen conversations.
How to rename:
- Find the conversation in your chat history
- Right-click (or click the three-dot menu)
- Select Rename
- Enter a descriptive name: “Q3 Budget Review — Marcus” or “Client Proposal — Acme Corp”
Naming strategy that works
Marcus at Horizon Logistics developed a naming convention for his Copilot conversations:
- Topic — Person/Project — Date: “Warehouse Efficiency — Q3 Review — Oct”
- Action — Subject: “Draft — Partner Email”
- Meeting — Event: “Standup Recap — Mon 14th”
When he needs to find something, the descriptive names make search instant. His team adopted the same convention.
Deleting a chat
Sometimes you need to remove a conversation — test prompts, sensitive topics, or just tidying up.
How to delete:
- Find the conversation in your chat history
- Right-click (or click the three-dot menu)
- Select Delete
- Confirm deletion
Important: Deleting a chat removes it from your history. However, if you’ve saved memories from that conversation (via Copilot Memory), those memories persist separately — deleting the chat does NOT delete saved memories. You manage memories in Settings separately.
Adding a conversation to a notebook
When a Copilot conversation produces valuable insights you want to keep long-term, you can add it to a notebook:
- In the conversation, find the response you want to keep
- Click the Add to notebook option
- The content is saved to your Copilot notebook — a persistent space for curated AI insights
Notebooks are great for:
- Research findings you want to reference later
- Key decisions or analysis from Copilot conversations
- Draft content you’re building iteratively over multiple sessions
| Action | What It Does | When to Use |
|---|---|---|
| Find | Browse or search your conversation history | Looking for a previous chat or insight |
| Rename | Change the auto-generated conversation title | After an important conversation — name it clearly for future searching |
| Delete | Permanently remove a conversation from history | Test prompts, sensitive conversations, general tidying |
| Add to notebook | Save specific responses to a persistent notebook | Valuable insights, research, decisions you'll reference again |
Real-world: Dana's clean-up routine
Every Friday, Dana at Oakfield Healthcare spends 5 minutes managing her Copilot conversations:
- Renames important chats from the week: “Onboarding Policy Update — April” instead of “Tell me about the onboarding policy”
- Deletes test prompts and one-off questions she won’t need again
- Adds to notebook any policy analysis or decision summaries she wants to keep
- Leaves ongoing project conversations as-is for next week
Result: When someone asks about a policy decision from 3 months ago, Dana can search her renamed history and find it in seconds.
🎬 Video walkthrough
Flashcards
Knowledge Check
Jordan has been using Copilot for 3 months and has over 200 conversations. He needs to find a specific chat where he analysed competitor pricing last month. What should he do?
Ava found a great Copilot analysis of BrightLoop's Q3 campaign performance that she wants to reference during next quarter's planning. What should she do?
Next up: Ready to explore Copilot agents? Learn when to browse the Agent Store for a pre-built solution versus building your own from scratch.