Get started with Cowork

_{Last updated: August 2026}

Copilot Cowork carries out tasks on your behalf. You describe what you need in natural language, and Cowork does the work, creating documents, drafting and sending email, scheduling meetings, and managing files. You review and approve sensitive actions before it happens.

Cowork is available for both work or school accounts and personal Microsoft accounts. This article helps you set up Cowork for your account type and complete your first task.

For browser-based tasks, Copilot interacts with websites in a human like way, such as clicking, scrolling, and typing. You may be able to observe the task as it runs, stop it at any time, or take control when required. Some tasks may complete quickly, while others may take longer depending on complexity. As a task runs, you may see progress updates or intermediate results. Copilot will pause and ask for your input if additional approval or information is needed.

What you can do with Cowork

• Create and edit Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, PowerPoint presentations, and PDFs.
• Draft, reply to, and send email, and manage your calendar.
• Manage your files in OneDrive.
• Research topics across multiple sources and compile the results.
• Prepare daily briefings and summaries.
• Run prompts on a schedule so recurring tasks happen automatically.

If you sign in with a work or school account, Cowork can also post messages in Teams, search across your organization for files and people, and work with files in SharePoint.

Set up Cowork

How you get access to Cowork depends on the type of account you sign in with. In both cases, Cowork runs in your browser at m365.cloud.microsoft and in the Microsoft 365 Copilot desktop app.

For work or school accounts

• Make sure you have a Microsoft 365 Copilot license, Cowork enabled in your Microsoft 365 Copilot environment, and usage-based and Cowork billing enabled. Additional details can be found in the Learn documentation.

For personal accounts (preview)

• Sign in with a personal Microsoft account that has an eligible Microsoft 365 subscription.

Start a conversation

Describe what you want Cowork to do in natural language, or select one of the suggested prompts on the home page.

1. Open Microsoft 365 Copilot.
2. Select Cowork in the top toggle next to Chat.
3. Enter your request in the text box. You can type up to 16,000 characters. For example: Send an email to the marketing team summarizing last week's campaign results.

You can also:

• Attach files: Drag and drop files onto the text box, select Upload images and files to browse your device, or select Attach cloud files to pick files from OneDrive or, for enterprise accounts, SharePoint or Teams. These options appear when you select the plus sign (+) in the text box.

• Use voice input: To speak your request instead of typing, select the microphone button in the text box.

Follow along as Cowork works

After you send your message, Cowork processes your request and shows each step in the conversation:

• Thinking indicator: Shows that Cowork is processing your request.
• Skill messages: Indicate when Cowork loads a skill it needs, such as "Preparing to compose emails" or "Preparing to create Word documents."
• Step-by-step updates: Show what Cowork is doing at each stage, such as "Composing your email" or "Creating your presentation."
• Streaming response: The response appears in real time as Cowork works.
• Interactive cards: Some responses include interactive cards with structured layouts, buttons, and data displays directly in the conversation.

Cowork might also ask you a question to clarify your request. When this happens, you see a set of choices to pick from. Select an option, type your own answer, or select Skip to let Cowork continue without additional input.

If you think of something else while Cowork is still working, you can send another message, and Cowork will adjust its approach accordingly.

Approve actions

Before Cowork takes certain actions, including writing files, it asks for your permission. The approval dialog shows a preview of what Cowork plans to do and a button labeled with the specific action.

• Approve button (for example, Send, Post, or Create): Allow this specific action to proceed.
• Cancel: Stop this action.

You can also pause Cowork at any time (to finish the current step, or immediately), resume when you're ready, or cancel the task entirely.

Copilot will ask for your approval or hand control back to you for some actions to help reduce the risk of unintended outcomes.

These include:

• Monetary transactions, such as completing a purchase or submitting payment.
• Submitting personal information to external websites, such as names, addresses, or phone numbers.
• Actions involving other people, such as sending emails or messages.
• Account altering actions, including deleting files, modifying cloud storage, canceling subscriptions, or changing account settings.
• Sensitive actions, such as health related submissions, government documents, or security related changes. Copilot only submits personal information when you approve an action that sends it to another service or website. For these scenarios, you remain in control and must explicitly approve or complete the action yourself. For scheduled or recurring tasks, Copilot may ask for required approvals during setup so the task can run unattended in the future.

Copilot may ask you to take over if a site restricts automated interaction, requires additional sign-in steps or manual interaction (such as for purchases, bookings, or accessing protected content), or presents other challenges.

Review files and results

When Cowork creates or modifies files during a conversation, they appear in the side panel on the right. The side panel shows the task Progress, the Input folder with files you provide as context, and the Output folder with files Cowork creates. Each output file has Download and Preview buttons.

Select any file to open an inline preview, expand it to full screen, or open it in its native app. You can also open files Cowork creates in OneDrive.

Control the conversation

You can manage or interrupt Cowork's work at any time during a conversation:

• Pause: Cowork finishes its current step and then pauses. You can also interrupt to pause immediately, even mid-step.
• Resume: Continue from where Cowork stopped.
• Cancel: Stop the current task entirely. You can send a new message without needing to resume.

Do more with Cowork

As Cowork works, it loads specialized skills for tasks like creating documents, managing your calendar, and preparing briefings. When it uses a new skill during your conversation, a message such as "Preparing to compose emails" appears, and the skill shows up in the side panel.

If you sign in with a work or school account, you can extend Cowork with your own custom skills stored in OneDrive, and share skills you create with other people in your organization. To learn more, see Share skills and plugins.

Manage your tasks

To see all your conversations with Cowork, select the My tasks view. Use the Filters dropdown to show only specific tasks, such as those that need your input, are in progress, are complete, or are scheduled. Select a task to open its conversation and continue working.

Schedule prompts

You can schedule a prompt to run automatically at a set time or on a recurring basis. Scheduled prompts are useful for tasks you want Cowork to handle regularly, such as a daily briefing or a weekly status report.

Describe the task and the timing in your message using natural language—for example, "Send me a daily briefing every morning at 9 AM." Cowork confirms the schedule and asks for your approval before activating it. You can edit, pause, or cancel scheduled prompts from the Scheduled tab in the My tasks view or the Scheduled section in the side panel.

Provide feedback

You can share feedback in several ways:

• Thumbs up or thumbs down: Rate a response from Cowork directly in the conversation.
• Document feedback: When previewing a file Cowork created, use the feedback controls to rate it.
• General feedback: To share broader comments, open the menu and select the feedback option.

What Cowork uses and stores

Copilot may use and store limited data to perform and review tasks:

• Conversation and task history: Your prompts and Copilot’s responses are saved so you can review past tasks.
• Screenshots: For browser-based tasks, Copilot may capture screenshots of pages it interacts with to understand and complete the task. Copilot does not capture screenshots while you are in control of the browser, though screenshots taken once you return control of the browser to Copilot may include information you entered on the screen. Non-browser tasks do not capture page screenshots. Screenshots are retained for a limited time and are not used for training.
• Connectors: Copilot may link to other services via connectors you authorize to perform tasks, such as drafting your emails or managing your calendar. Copilot accesses information from these services only as needed to perform a task, and upon your direction it may do so on a scheduled, recurring, or ongoing basis. Copilot does not independently store your information from these services. You can link or unlink individual Connectors at any time in your Copilot settings.

There are two options to manage your available connectors within Cowork:

• You can disconnect the connector entirely, which fully removes its access to your account.
• Or you can toggle it off, which pauses Cowork's use of it without removing the underlying connection so it's easy to turn back on later.

You shouldn't provide Cowork with access to any confidential or sensitive personal data that you would not want Cowork to use for performing activities on your behalf. This includes data that might reveal, for example, your race, religion, sexual orientation, or health status.

Copilot does not store sensitive information such as passwords, credit card numbers, bank account details, or government ID numbers.

Cowork security considerations

Cowork introduces additional security considerations because it can take actions on your behalf.

• Unintended actions: Copilot may misunderstand your request or act differently than you expect. Review task outcomes carefully and stop a task if behavior seems unexpected.
• Prompt injection: Some websites or content may include hidden or misleading instructions intended to manipulate automated systems. You should remain attentive. Monitor the task closely. If Copilot navigates to unexpected sites, requests unfamiliar approvals, or attempts actions you did not intend, pause or cancel the task and review it before proceeding.
• Financial risks: Cowork interactions involving purchases or payments require your approval. Always confirm details before completing a transaction.
• Privacy risks: Cowork interactions may interact with websites that request or process personal or sensitive data. Copilot will ask for approval before submitting personal information externally. Copilot includes safeguards designed to help reduce these risks, but you remain responsible for reviewing and approving important actions taken on your behalf.
• Actions requiring the advice of a professional: Copilot is not a professional advisor, so you should not rely on it for actions requiring financial, legal, medical, or other advice or judgment.

Copilot uses safety and security policies to reduce risk when performing browser based actions. While Cowork can interact with many websites, it does not work with every site. Some categories of sites may require your approval or be blocked entirely based on safety and security policies. Cowork may ask you to take over if a site restricts automated interaction, requires additional sign-in steps or manual interaction (such as purchases, bookings, or accessing protected content), or presents other challenges.

When is user approval required?

Copilot will ask for your approval or hand control back to you for certain actions to help reduce the risk of unintended outcomes.

These include:

• Monetary transactions, such as completing a purchase or submitting payment.
• Submitting personal information to external websites, such as names, addresses, or phone numbers.
• Actions involving other people, such as sending emails or messages.
• Account‑altering actions, including deleting files, modifying cloud storage, canceling subscriptions, or changing account settings.
• Sensitive actions, such as health‑related submissions, government documents, or security‑related changes.

Copilot only submits personal information when you approve an action that sends it to another service or website. For these scenarios, you remain in control and must explicitly approve or complete the action yourself. For scheduled or recurring tasks, Copilot may ask for required approvals during setup so the task can run unattended in the future.

Use of Cowork interactions

Microsoft will only use your Cowork interaction data for the limited purposes explained in the Microsoft Privacy Statement to troubleshoot problems, diagnose bugs, prevent abuse, and to monitor, analyze, and improve performance, and so we can provide Copilot to you.

If you are logged into Cowork with a Microsoft Account or other third-party authentication, you can control whether your activity is used for training Microsoft's generative AI models.

In addition, some Cowork interactions are subject to both automated and human review for product improvement and digital safety purposes. Task logs, screenshots, and outputs are retained for limited periods to support functionality, safety, and troubleshooting.

Limitations

• Cowork might misinterpret ambiguous or overly broad instructions. Provide clear, specific requests for better results.
• Treat AI-generated documents, emails, and messages as drafts. Always review content before approving send or share actions.
• Always review forms that Cowork has filled-in before submitting.
• Complex multistep tasks with many dependencies might not always complete as expected.
• Cowork can only access the data and services that your account is authorized to use.
• Cowork can't access files stored on your local device. It works with files in OneDrive and other connected cloud services.
• Cowork can't delete files or folders in OneDrive or SharePoint.
• Voice input availability depends on your browser. Not all browsers support this feature.

Related topics

• Application card for Microsoft 365 Copilot
• Copilot in Microsoft 365 Personal, Family, and Premium