Microsoft 365 Copilot in the browser: how working from Chrome or Edge changes

We can already enjoy Microsoft 365 Copilot in the browser. At least in Chrome and Edge. Thus, it becomes that “AI companion” that helps you while you browse, work, or study, without forcing you to completely change how you use your computer. Whether you're reading an article, watching a video, or reviewing an online document, you can ask it anything you want and get contextualized answers without leaving the page.

The grace of Copilot es que It does not limit itself to answering isolated questionsIt understands the context of your browsing, can summarize pages, analyze files, generate images, and connect with your work data (in the case of Microsoft 365 Copilot). All of this comes with different privacy and security options depending on whether you use it with a personal, educational, or corporate account.

What is Microsoft Copilot and how does it work in the browser?

Copilot is Microsoft's conversational artificial intelligence systemDesigned for interaction via text or voice through a chat, it relies on advanced language models (LLM) from the GPT family—the same ones ChatGPT is based on—and image generation technologies such as DALL·E 3.

The big difference compared to other generic AIs Copilot is constantly connected to the internet, so it can combine general model knowledge with up-to-date web searches. This results in more recent answers, with citations and links to sources so you can verify the information just like you would with a traditional search.

Furthermore, Copilot is deeply integrated with the Microsoft ecosystemWord, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, Forms, Teams, Microsoft 365 on the web, and even Windows. Depending on the license type and version, it can analyze your emails, documents, shared files, and business data through Microsoft Graph.

In the browser, Copilot can respond via chat or voice.Simply click on the Copilot icon in the top right corner of Edge, or access it via the web in Chrome or other browsers, to start a conversation without leaving what you're viewing.

 

Where to use Copilot: copilot.microsoft.com, Bing Chat, Edge, Windows, and Microsoft 365

Copilot is not a single product, but a family of experiences which are presented differently depending on the context: browser, desktop, mobile or Microsoft 365 applications. It is important to distinguish each variant well to know what you can expect in terms of features and data protection.

Copilot in Microsoft 365 (Copilot for work and education)

Microsoft 365 Copilot is the "high-end" version for businesses and educational institutions.It is based on Bing Chat Enterprise but adds advanced capabilities to reason about documents, emails, meetings, business data and Microsoft 365 content using Microsoft Graph.

Among its key features, It offers security, privacy, and regulatory compliance at the enterprise level.The data is processed under the Microsoft Data Protection Agreement (DPA) and Product Terms, with Microsoft acting as the data processor. This version is not intended for personal or local accounts; it is accessed using Microsoft 365 or Microsoft Login (formerly Azure AD) credentials.

Some organizations, such as the University of Seville, They haven't yet enabled the full Microsoft 365 CopilotTherefore, its users rely on the free version of Copilot (Bing Chat) with commercial/educational data protection, while they await the full activation of the service.

Copilot on Bing (bing.com/chat)

Copilot in Bing is the integrated experience in the Microsoft search engine, accessible directly from the URL bing.com/chatIt's ideal for performing rich searches, exploring information from across the web, getting summaries, comparing options, or requesting inspiration for ideas, text, and images.

In its standard form, You don't need to log in to ask basic questions.However, signing in with a Microsoft account (personal or work/educational) can offer a more personalized experience and, in the case of organizational accounts, enable enterprise data protection.

Copilot on the web: copilot.microsoft.com

The direction https://copilot.microsoft.com It offers a chat-centric Copilot experience, visually very similar to Bing Chat, but presented as the "official portal" for Microsoft Copilot. It can be used for personal, work, or education purposes, depending on the account you log in with.

In practice, copilot.microsoft.com and bing.com/chat share the same AI engineHowever, they differ in context: one integrates more with the Bing search experience, while the other functions as a web chat app. If you sign in with your school or corporate account, you'll see indications that enterprise data protection is in place (for example, a shield icon in the upper right corner).

Copilot in Microsoft Edge

The version of Copilot integrated into Microsoft Edge is one of the most practical for everyday use.Because it lives in the browser's sidebar. Simply click the Copilot icon in the top right corner of Edge to open a side panel while still viewing the current page.

Thanks to this integration, Copilot can understand what you're seeing at that moment (a website, a PDF, an online document…) and offer features such as:

• Page summary: to condense a long article, technical documentation, or PDF into a few key points.
• Contextual ad suggestions: Generate suggestions based on the open page to help you ask better questions or delve deeper into the content.
• Text rewriting (next function): rewrite the text you are writing on the web to adjust tone, length or style.

To get the most out of it, You must sign in to Edge with your Microsoft account or Microsoft Sign InIn enterprise environments (Edge for Business), data loss prevention (DLP) policies can be applied that regulate what can or cannot be summarized or sent to Copilot from internal content.

Copilot in Windows (Copilot in the taskbar)

Another important variant is Copilot integrated into Windows, accessible from the taskbar or with the shortcut Windows + C in certain markets. It acts as a centralized assistant capable of helping you with system tasks, configuration, apps, and, optionally, web-connected capabilities via Microsoft Copilot (formerly Bing Chat).

This experience is being rolled out gradually, Availability is limited depending on the country and Windows version.In some environments, such as certain universities, it is not yet active on a massive scale.

Copilot in Chrome, Edge and other browsers: what changes and what stays the same

A common question is whether Copilot is only "worth it" in Edge or if it's also useful in Chrome or other browsers.The reality is that you can use Copilot on virtually all modern browsers, with some nuances in the experience.

On one hand, Copilot Chat (Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat) supports Microsoft Edge and other major browsers like Chrome, Firefox, and Safari. You can access it from the Copilot website or the Microsoft 365 Copilot web app if you have a license. However, the integrated sidebar experience—with page context—is exclusive to Microsoft Edge.

This means that if you browse with Chrome, You can easily access copilot.microsoft.com or bing.com/chat and use almost all the chat functions, file analysis, image generation, etc. What you won't have natively is that side panel attached to the right that accompanies all the tabs (although you can always leave the Copilot tab pinned and toggle it).

If you use Edge, You gain convenience and certain contextual functions, such as a direct summary of the open page, suggestions related to what you are viewing and, in business scenarios, a tighter integration with security policies (DLP, control of sensitive data, etc.).

In both cases, if you use a work or school account with enterprise data protectionCopilot Chat does not use your data to train baseline models, and traffic is governed by Microsoft's privacy and compliance commitments.

Copilot Vision and Memories: differences between specific context and local memory

New features have appeared within the Copilot ecosystem that can lead to confusion, especially Copilot Vision and Recall, who have very different objectives.

Copilot Vision It only works with the context you choose to share during the session: this could be a page open in Edge, an app on Windows, or even the camera from the Copilot mobile app. When you activate Vision, Copilot "sees" what's in front of you to help you interpret, summarize, or extract useful information.

Importantly, Vision does not permanently store screenshots or visual contextThe only thing that's saved is the text transcript of the conversation in your chat history, which you can delete at any time. Copilot doesn't save images or audio beyond what's necessary to respond.

For its part, Recall is an exclusive feature of PC Copilot+In this case, the system periodically captures encrypted snapshots of the screen (applications, websites, documents, images…), which are stored and analyzed locally on your device.

The goal is to offer a kind of private “photographic memory”This allows you to "remember" something you saw days or weeks ago, even if you don't recall which app or file it was in. All this information remains on your PC, under your control, with configuration and deletion options, and is subject to specific privacy guidelines documented by Microsoft.

Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat: what it is, how it differs, and what it offers

Within the professional and educational environment, Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat is the web-based chat experience Included for organizations with a Microsoft 365 subscription. It is a question-answer interface powered by language models, very similar to the "general" Copilot, but geared towards work and study.

Microsoft 365 Copilot (the full product) is an additional license. that your organization contracts and assigns to specific users. This license expands what Copilot Chat can do by giving it controlled access to business data: SharePoint files, Exchange emails, OneDrive for Business content, third-party data integrated through Microsoft Graph connectors, and more.

In other words, Copilot Chat without a Microsoft 365 license: Copilot cannot access your Graph data (neither shared, nor personal, nor indexed external files). You can manually upload files to the chat for analysis, but it cannot automatically browse your entire workspace.

If the organization enables agents and connectors through Copilot Studio, Users will be able to interact with specialized agents that are fed by specific SharePoint sites, shared tenant files, or data from third-party applications, always under the administrator's configuration.

Copilot Chat and Copilot Studio Agents: Intelligent Automation

The Copilot Chat agents These are AI experiences that execute processes, answer specialized questions, or assist in specific workflows, working alongside a person, a team, or even partially autonomously.

There are different types of agents:

• Declarative agents based on instructions and public sites, which do not access internal or tenant data and have no additional cost.
• Agents that access content through SharePoint or Microsoft Graph connectorswhich are billed per use and require the administrator to set up a Copilot Studio subscription.

Administrators can manage which agents are availablewhich knowledge sources they can use and how they are presented to users. Management is done through the Microsoft 365 admin center and the Power Platform tools associated with Copilot Studio.

Depending on the configuration of the internal Microsoft 365 and Teams app store, Certain free agents may be activated by default.while payment agents or those with access to sensitive data are explicitly enabled.

Enterprise Data Protection (EDP) and Privacy in Copilot Chat

When users connect to Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat with a Microsoft account Sign in, applies what Microsoft calls Enterprise Data Protection (EDP)It is not a separate product, but rather the set of data protection controls and commitments that are included in the Data Protection Annex (DPA) and the Product Terms.

With active EDP, Chat requests and responses are recorded and stored to enable auditing functionalities, eDiscovery, and other advanced capabilities of Microsoft Purview, in line with the organization's subscription plan.

A key point is that, under EDP, Copilot Chat messages and responses are not used to train the base models.They are also not shared with OpenAI for training their models. Microsoft acts as the data controller, applying encryption and strict access controls to customer data.

Furthermore, Copilot Chat respects settings like Bing SafeSearch (including Strict mode) and offers specific compliance guarantees: HIPAA, FERPA, EU Data Boundary (EUDB), copyright commitment against third-party claims for use of generated content, etc., provided the implementation is properly configured.

Key features of Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat

Copilot Chat is continuously adding new capabilities, both for the general version and for the one integrated into EdgeAmong the currently available features, the following stand out:

• Copilot PagesIt converts chat-generated content into a dynamic (SharePoint-based) page that can be edited, enriched, shared, and co-created in real time. A SharePoint license is required.
• File loading and analysisIt allows you to upload Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, PDFs, presentations, and more, so Copilot can summarize them, analyze data, create visualizations, or answer questions about them. The files are stored in OneDrive for Business and can be deleted at any time.
• Imaging: creates images from text descriptions, relying on models like DALL·E, with daily usage limits.
• chat history: access to past conversations to review them again or continue where you left off.
• Custom Agents: interaction with agents created in Copilot Studio or available in the organization's internal store.
• Image loading and analysis: allows you to paste or upload images so that Copilot can describe them, extract information, or generate content based on them.
• code interpreter: a Python-based tool for performing data analysis, advanced calculations, graph generation, and small programming tasks directly from the chat.
• Dictation, reading aloud, and real-time voice: type using a microphone, listen to chat responses and, for users with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license, hold interactive voice conversations in real time.

In addition, Edge appears specific functions such as page summary and contextual suggestionsAnd in the near future, the feature of rewriting text directly onto form fields or online editors will be reintroduced.

Microsoft 365 Copilot extension for Edge: Connect Microsoft 365 with third-party apps

For Microsoft 365 users in a corporate environment, The Microsoft 365 Copilot extension for Edge adds an extra layer of context which improves the relevance of the results generated by Copilot from your work tools, including third-party applications.

This extension makes it so that Copilot better understands what you're really working on: incidents, tasks, documents, knowledge pages… coming from both Microsoft 365 and services such as Confluence, Jira, ServiceNow, Google Drive, GitHub, Salesforce, Azure DevOps, among other compatible connectors.

So, when you search for something like “Q3 plan”, Copilot prioritizes the items you've recently interacted with.It might be a specific Confluence page for you, while for someone else it's a Google Drive document. The idea is to reduce friction between the Microsoft world and the applications your organization already uses daily.

The extension is installed from the Microsoft Edge add-ons pageAlternatively, it can be deployed centrally by the tenant administrator. Once installed, it runs in the background without any further action required; you can manage it by typing edge://extensions in the address bar or using the browser's extensions icon (puzzle piece).

In terms of data, The extension only collects the user's intended behavior. (for example, which pages of certain apps approved by the organization you visit) and contextual metadata (origin application, item type, identifiers, etc.), always under encryption and with strong access controls. All of this aligns with the organization's compliance policies.

Thanks to the integration with Microsoft Copilot connectorsContent from tools such as Azure DevOps, Jira, Confluence, ServiceNow (issues, catalog, knowledge base), Google Drive, GitHub, or Salesforce may appear in Copilot responses, always depending on the connections and permissions enabled by the IT department.

Closing the circle, Copilot in browsers like Chrome or Edge has become a cross-cutting tool It combines intelligent chat, web access, connection to professional data, and information protection, adapting to personal, educational, and business contexts; the key is which account you log in with, which version you use (personal, Copilot Chat, Microsoft 365 Copilot), and what policies your organization has defined to take advantage of it without putting your data at risk.