Microsoft Copilot vs. GitHub Copilot: Same Name, Completely Different Jobs

This one trips up more people than it should, mostly because Microsoft reused a name for two unrelated products. Microsoft Copilot is the assistant baked into Word, Excel, Outlook, and Teams — it drafts emails, summarizes meetings, and builds slide decks from a rough outline. GitHub Copilot, on the other hand, lives inside your code editor and has nothing to do with spreadsheets or PowerPoint. It autocompletes functions, suggests entire blocks of code, and explains unfamiliar snippets line by line as you write.

Mixing them up isn't a small mistake either — a developer expecting code suggestions won't find them in Microsoft 365's Copilot, and an office worker hoping for email drafts will be confused by GitHub's interface entirely. Under the hood they're both powered by variations of OpenAI's models, which is probably where the naming confusion started in the first place.

If your day involves spreadsheets, documents, and calendar juggling, you want Microsoft 365 Copilot. If your day involves a terminal and a code editor, GitHub Copilot is the one worth the subscription. Check which "Copilot" your job actually needs before you sign up for the wrong one — it happens more often than you'd think.