---
title: "What Survived the Copilot Cull? A Fast Excel Audit"
date: 2026-09-08T00:00:00Z
updated: 2026-09-13T05:48:46Z
tags: ["AI & Copilot", "Excel, Formulas & Functions", "Microsoft 365 Apps", "Automation", "Getting Started"]
canonical: https://bianca.codes/blog/what-survived-the-copilot-cull-fast-excel-audit/
---

# What Survived the Copilot Cull? A Fast Excel Audit

_On 15 April 2026 the Copilot button vanished from Excel with no in-app notice. This is the dated six-row audit of which surfaces still answer you, which refuse, and which never could._

On 15 April 2026, the Copilot button disappeared from Excel, Word, PowerPoint, and OneNote for anyone without a paid licence at an org over 2,000 seats. Mine was one of them.

There was no in-app note, no move prompt, and nothing in the File menu to explain where it went. The button was there on Tuesday and gone on Wednesday. The first clear write-up I found was a university IT helpdesk page.

You are building a six-row audit sheet. It shows which Copilot screens still answer you, which refuse, and which can still read a workbook if you hand it over another way. It takes about five minutes. You do not need admin rights. Every row is dated, because every answer has a short shelf life.

You need Excel (desktop or web), your work account, a throwaway workbook with about fifty rows of messy data, and a browser tab.

**This post has a download:** a pre-labelled audit sheet plus a deliberately messy sample workbook. [Jump to Downloads](https://bianca.codes/blog/what-survived-the-copilot-cull-fast-excel-audit/#downloads).

## Why the audit beats the docs

The docs describe the paid tier. That is not a plot, just how the product is sold. The paid tier gets the marketing budget, so the guides, feature pages, and launch posts mostly describe what a Microsoft 365 Copilot licence gives you. The removal went out through Message Center alerts for admins, not a public page, which is why the clearest public notes are things like [Washington State University's ITS notice](https://its.wsu.edu/2026/04/29/copilot-chat-removed-from-word-excel-powerpoint-and-onenote/) rather than anything on Microsoft's site.

So you cannot read your way to an answer about your own machine. You have to test it. The gap between "what Copilot does" and "what Copilot does for you, today, on this build" is wide enough to waste an afternoon.

## Step 1: Find which side of the 2,000-seat line you are on

The limit is org size, not your job title or your team. Orgs with more than 2,000 Microsoft 365 users lost in-app Copilot Chat for unlicensed staff. Orgs under that line kept it in Word, Excel, and PowerPoint under standard access, with throttling at peak times and prompts to upgrade.

You will not find this number in Excel. Ask whoever runs your tenant, or estimate it from headcount if your org is nowhere near the line. Record the answer as a number and a source, not as a guess. "About 3,000, per IT, 8 Sep" is an audit row. "I think we're a big org" is not.

## Step 2: Record the Excel ribbon and build together

Open Excel, check the Home tab, and note whether a Copilot button is there. Then go to File \> Account \> About Excel and copy the version and build string.

Put those two items in the same row. A feature without a build number is just a story. Six weeks from now, when the button comes back or vanishes again, the build is the only way to tell whether your setup changed or your memory did. This is the habit that makes the sheet worth keeping.

While you are there, check the label. Microsoft added in-app labels with the change: **Copilot Chat (Basic)** for users without a paid licence, **M365 Copilot (Premium)** for users with one. That label is the fastest way to settle the argument in your team.

## Step 3: Test the standalone app

Open the Microsoft 365 Copilot app, or use the web app, and sign in with your work account. Upload the throwaway workbook and ask something that cannot be answered unless it reads the file. Not "what does this sheet do" but "which three customers in this file have the biggest gap between invoiced and paid, and what are the amounts".

Two things go in the audit row. First, whether the upload control appears. Second, whether the answer uses real values from your file or gives a smooth paragraph about invoicing in general. The second fail is the one that tricks people, because it sounds like an answer.

This is the most important row, because it shows where the capability moved rather than where it died. The Excel pane is gone. The ability to ask questions about a workbook is not.

## Step 4: Test Outlook on its own

Outlook was left out of the removal. Mail and calendar grounding kept working for unlicensed users when the four Office apps lost theirs, which means your org can be "Copilot is gone" and "Copilot is fine" at the same time, depending on the window.

Summarise a long thread and check the summary against the thread. If you want the version with more method, I wrote up turning a forty-email thread into three lines in August. For the audit, one row is enough: works, weak, or refused.

## Step 5: Test the thing you never lost

Ask about a file that lives elsewhere in your tenant. A SharePoint file, a colleague's shared workbook, or something in a Teams channel. Expect a refusal or a polite non-answer.

Record that row as **never included**, not **removed**. Grounding in your org's own content is a paid-tier feature and always was, so a refusal here means the product is working as designed. Writing that down matters because it stops you opening a ticket for a feature you never had, and it stops a colleague from saying, with confidence, that it used to work.

If a surface refuses something you think it should do, the problem is often the prompt, not the licence. That is a separate fight, and I have already made it.

## Step 6: Date the sheet and set an expiry

Six rows, one date, one build number. Something close to this:

### The audit tab, filled in on 8 September

_Worksheet tab: Audit_

It ships blank, with the six surfaces already labelled. This is what it looks like once a run is in it.

Formula bar: `=IF(COUNT(tblAudit[Date])=0,"Fill in the dates below",IF(TODAY()-MAX(tblAudit[Date])>fnParam("Staleness days"),"Re-run this audit","Current as of "&TEXT(MAX(tblAudit[Date]),"d mmm yyyy")))`

| Date | Surface | Result | Build / note |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 2026-09-08 | Org size vs threshold | Over | ~3,100 seats, per IT |
| 2026-09-08 | Excel ribbon | Refused | 16.0.18827.20164, no Copilot button |
| 2026-09-08 | Label under account | Basic | "Copilot Chat (Basic)" |
| 2026-09-08 | Standalone app + upload | Works | Quoted real values from the file |
| 2026-09-08 | Outlook thread summary | Works | Inbox grounding intact |
| 2026-09-08 | Tenant file grounding | Never included | Paid-tier feature |

**01 — Every row carries its build** The build string in column D is what makes a row reproducible six weeks later. A result without one is a memory, not a record.

**02 — Never included is not removed** Tenant file grounding was always paid-tier. Recording it as never included stops you raising a ticket for a feature you never had.

**03 — Two more columns in the file** The workbook adds What to look for and Suggested answers beside these four, so you do not have to come back to the post to fill a row in.

Then make the sheet tell you when it has gone stale, instead of trusting yourself to remember:

```vba
=IF(TODAY()-A2>90,"Re-run this audit","Current as of "&TEXT(A2,"d mmm yyyy"))
```

Ninety days is a guess, and a generous one. This set of answers changed twice in the year before I wrote it down, so treat the number as the longest you should wait, not a rule.

If you want the sheet ready-made, [grab the download](https://bianca.codes/blog/what-survived-the-copilot-cull-fast-excel-audit/#downloads).

## Common mistakes

### **Recording a capability without the build number.**

The most common way this sheet becomes useless is being right in a way you cannot repeat. Six weeks later something works differently and you cannot tell whether Microsoft shipped a change, your admin changed a policy, or you tested a slightly different thing the first time. The build string takes four seconds, and it is the gap between an audit and a note to self.

### **Treating every refusal as a bug.**

Three things can cause a refusal: a feature removed in April, a feature that was never on the free tier, and a feature that exists but was asked for badly. They look the same from the outside, and they need different fixes. Sorting the refusal into the right box when you see it is most of the value of doing this on purpose rather than by accident.

### **Auditing with a clean toy workbook.**

Fifty neat rows with clean headers will get you a confident answer from almost anything, which tells you nothing about the file you really need help with. Use one with merged cells, a stray TOTAL row in the middle, and at least one column where dates are text. If a surface handles that, the row means something.

## Frequently Asked Questions

### **Did Microsoft remove Copilot from Excel for everyone?**

No. The removal on 15 April 2026 applied to users without a paid Microsoft 365 Copilot licence at orgs with more than 2,000 Microsoft 365 users. Smaller orgs kept Copilot Chat in Word, Excel, and PowerPoint under standard access, which throttles performance at peak times. Anyone with a paid Copilot licence was unaffected.

### **Why did the Copilot button disappear from Excel with no warning?**

The change was sent to tenant admins through a Microsoft 365 Message Center notice rather than through an in-app announcement or a public doc page. If your IT team did not forward it, the first sign for most people was the button being missing. For this reason, the most straightforward public information about the change can be found on university and enterprise IT helpdesk pages, instead of Microsoft's website.

### **Can I still ask questions about an Excel file without a Copilot licence?**

Usually yes, but not from inside Excel. The standalone Microsoft 365 Copilot app and the web version still accept a file upload and answer questions about its contents for unlicensed users. The flow changes from pointing at a workbook you have open to handing over a copy of it, which is slower but still reaches the same answer.

### **Does Copilot still work in Outlook if it was removed from Excel?**

Yes. Outlook was carved out of the April 2026 removal, so inbox and calendar grounding kept working for unlicensed users after Copilot Chat disappeared from Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote. It is normal to have a working Copilot in one Microsoft app and no Copilot at all in another on the same account.

### **How do I tell which Copilot tier I am on?**

Microsoft added in-app labels when it made the change. "Copilot Chat (Basic)" means a user without a paid Microsoft 365 Copilot licence, and "M365 Copilot (Premium)" means a user with one. Checking the label takes a few seconds and settles most arguments about whose Copilot is broken.

### **How often should I re-run this audit?**

Every ninety days is a fair ceiling, and sooner if your Office build number changes or your org's licensing does. The underlying answers moved twice in the twelve months to September 2026, so an audit older than a quarter should be treated as a starting guess rather than a fact.

## Where to go from here

Once your sheet is filled in, the next question is what to do with the surfaces that survived. That is the tested map of what is still reachable and what it is genuinely good at, coming up in [what is left of Copilot after the Excel pane disappears](/blog/whats-left-of-copilot-after-the-pane-disappears/).

And if the whole exercise has left you a little annoyed about how you found out, that is fair. It is the same feeling I was circling in "Copilot did not arrive as a feature; it arrived as an expectation."

## Downloads

### Copilot surface audit sheet + messy sample workbook

The six-row audit from the post, pre-labelled with what to look for at each surface and a staleness banner driven by fnParam. Plus a deliberately messy 50-row sample - text dates, a stray TOTAL row, amounts stored as text - to hand over when you test whether a surface can read a file.

- File: `build-an-audit-of-what-survived-the-copilot-cull-download.xlsx` (XLSX, 18.5 KB)
- Contains macros: no
- Access: email required — https://bianca.codes/blog/what-survived-the-copilot-cull-fast-excel-audit/#downloads