Microsoft Copilot Comes to Office 2024: What UK Users Need to Know

Microsoft's AI assistant, Copilot, has moved from an experimental preview to a core feature of the Office ecosystem. Originally exclusive to Microsoft 365 subscribers with an additional paid add-on, Copilot functionality has gradually expanded—and as of early 2026, select Copilot features are now available to Office 2024 users as well.

For UK buyers weighing up their options, this changes the calculus. Here is everything you need to know about Copilot in Office, what it can do, and what it means for your purchasing decision.

What Is Microsoft Copilot?

Copilot is Microsoft's AI assistant, built on large language model technology (the same family of models that powers ChatGPT). It is embedded directly into Office applications—Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Teams—and can help you draft documents, analyse data, create presentations, summarise emails, and automate repetitive tasks using natural language commands.

Think of it as having an intelligent colleague who has read every help article, every template, and every formula reference guide—available on demand inside the apps you already use.

Copilot in Microsoft 365 vs Office 2024

The Copilot experience differs significantly depending on which version of Office you use:

Microsoft 365 + Copilot Add-On

Microsoft 365 subscribers can purchase the Copilot add-on (currently priced at £19 per user per month through enterprise channels, or bundled into certain business plans). This unlocks the full Copilot experience:

• Word: Draft entire documents from a prompt, rewrite sections, change tone, summarise long documents
• Excel: Generate formulas from natural language, create pivot tables with a sentence, analyse trends, generate Python code for complex data tasks
• PowerPoint: Create entire presentations from a prompt or outline, generate speaker notes, redesign slides
• Outlook: Summarise email threads, draft replies, schedule meetings from context clues
• Teams: Real-time meeting summaries, action-item extraction, transcript search

Office 2024 — Basic Copilot Features

Office 2024 includes a more limited Copilot integration at no additional cost:

• Word: Basic writing suggestions, grammar and style improvements, simple text rewriting
• Excel: Formula suggestions and error explanations
• PowerPoint: Design suggestions and layout recommendations

These features are powered by the free tier of Copilot and do not require a separate subscription. They are useful but noticeably less powerful than the full Microsoft 365 experience.

What Copilot Can Actually Do: Real-World Examples

Draft a Business Proposal in Word

Prompt: "Draft a three-page proposal for a website redesign project. The client is a medium-sized law firm in Manchester. Budget is £15,000. Timeline is eight weeks."

Copilot generates a structured proposal with sections for executive summary, scope of work, timeline, budget breakdown, and terms. You review, edit, and refine—cutting what would have been an hour's work down to fifteen minutes.

Analyse Sales Data in Excel

Prompt: "Show me which products had the highest revenue growth quarter-over-quarter and create a chart."

Copilot identifies the relevant columns, calculates growth rates, sorts the results, and generates a bar chart—all without you writing a single formula.

Build a Presentation from Scratch in PowerPoint

Prompt: "Create a ten-slide presentation on digital marketing trends for 2026, targeting UK small businesses."

Copilot produces a complete slide deck with titles, bullet points, suggested images, and speaker notes. The design follows your chosen template, and each slide is editable.

Privacy and Data Handling in the UK

Data privacy is a legitimate concern for UK users, particularly since the UK GDPR (retained from EU law post-Brexit) imposes strict requirements on how personal data is processed.

Microsoft has made several commitments regarding Copilot's data handling:

• Copilot does not train its AI models on your data
• Your prompts and document content are not shared with other users or organisations
• For enterprise customers, data processing occurs within Microsoft's EU Data Boundary (which covers UK-adjacent data centres)
• All Copilot interactions are subject to the same compliance certifications as the rest of Microsoft 365 (ISO 27001, SOC 2, etc.)

For individual consumers and small businesses, the privacy posture is generally strong, though power users should review Microsoft's data-processing addendum for the specifics of their plan.

The Cost Question: Is Copilot Worth It?

For Microsoft 365 subscribers, the full Copilot experience requires an additional £19 per user per month through enterprise licensing, or is increasingly included in premium consumer plans. At that price, it needs to save you at least an hour per week to justify the cost on pure productivity grounds.

For Office 2024 users, the basic Copilot features are free—making them a genuine bonus. You will not get the full AI-powered document generation, but the formula suggestions and writing improvements add real value at no extra cost.

Our take: if you are a solo user or small team buying Office 2024 at Softkeys.uk pricing (£29.99), the basic Copilot features are a welcome addition. If your work involves heavy document drafting, data analysis, or presentation creation, the full Copilot experience through Microsoft 365 (£19.99/year at Softkeys.uk) may be worth the upgrade.

How to Enable Copilot

In Office 2024

1. Ensure Office is updated to the latest version (File → Account → Update Options → Update Now)
2. Sign in with your Microsoft account
3. Look for the Copilot icon in the ribbon bar of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint
4. If you do not see it, check that your region is set to United Kingdom and that your Windows or macOS is fully updated

In Microsoft 365

1. Ensure your subscription is active and your apps are updated
2. If you have the Copilot add-on, the full Copilot panel will appear automatically in supported apps
3. For consumer plans, check your subscription page to confirm Copilot eligibility

What This Means for UK Buyers

The arrival of Copilot in Office 2024 is significant because it narrows the gap between the one-time purchase and the subscription model. Previously, AI features were a Microsoft 365 exclusive—now, even perpetual-licence users get a taste of AI assistance.

For most UK home users and students, Office 2024 with basic Copilot at £29.99 remains the best value. For professionals who want the full AI toolkit, Microsoft 365 at £19.99 per year is an increasingly compelling proposition.

Either way, AI is no longer a future promise—it is a present reality in your Office applications, and UK buyers are well-positioned to benefit.