According to a new blog post from Microsoft, Microsoft 365's Personal and Family plans have been bundled with Copilot and priced up to roughly $3 a month. The latest monthly cost is $9.99, up from $6.99, and the new annual fee is $99.99, up from $69.99.
In addition to the basic plans getting Copilot rolled in, there are now additional "Basic," "Personal Classic," and "Family Classic" tiers without Copilot and "other advanced features" added for users who do not use AI in their workflows.
For those who remain on the Personal and Family plans, a monthly allotment of 15 AI credits to use Copilot with Office 365 applications and Designer, Paint, Photos, and Notepad on Windows 11 will be given. Copilot Pro is still a separate upgrade for those who want unlimited use.
Microsoft's original blog post states, "Our plan has always been to make Copilot in the Microsoft 365 apps more accessible to a wider audience at a great price. We planned several steps in our Copilot journey to listen, learn, and improve usability and performance. [...] We’re delighted to empower millions of our customers with an AI assistant that supercharges the productivity apps they already know and love. We’ll continue offering Copilot Pro for consumers with extensive usage needs, along with Microsoft 365 Copilot, our commercial offering, for organizations of all sizes"
Past the details we discussed above, the rest of the original Microsoft blog post showcases existing Copilot features and how they're integrated into different aspects of the Microsoft 365 suite. Microsoft also claims that using these features will not surrender your prompts, responses, or even file content for use while training its Copilot AI model. Of course, Microsoft claims that using your data is a temporary input only when prompted.
Existing Microsoft 365 Personal and Family plan subscribers need only update their apps to receive their new Copilot benefits. For existing customers, the price hike won't be kicking in until plan renewal, and there are options to downgrade the plan. Those who want to avoid using AI can downgrade the plan to the "Classic" or "Basic" Microsoft 365 plans.
While this may have been a more controversial move from Microsoft— basically forcing AI use and a price hike on a large existing customer base— adding tiers without AI below the main Personal and Family plans is welcome. However, some contradictory language does leave some questions in the air. Apparently, the "Classic" plans are available "for a limited time". However, this may just refer to the ability for existing customers to downgrade since the following sentence immediately claims, "These plans (having just listed Basic and the two Classic plans) will continue to be maintained as they exist today."
