How to Enable Copilot Cowork: Admin and User Setup Guide

Copilot Cowork is off by default. Even if your organization has Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses, nobody can use Cowork until an admin turns it on. This guide covers exactly what admins need to do (it takes about five minutes), and how users find Cowork once it's enabled.

What you need before you start

• Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses assigned to users who will use Cowork.
• Admin access to the Microsoft 365 admin center (Global Admin or Billing Admin to set up billing; AI Admin or License Admin to manage spending policies).
• An Azure subscription for pay-as-you-go billing, or prepaid Copilot Credits.

Cowork uses Anthropic's Claude models under the hood. When you enable usage-based billing, Anthropic is automatically enabled as a subprocessor for your tenant.

How admins enable Copilot Cowork

The whole process happens in the Microsoft 365 admin center. Here's the step-by-step:

1. Sign in to the Microsoft 365 admin center as a Global Admin or Billing Admin.
2. Go to Copilot → Cost Management.
3. Select Get Started to begin setup.
4. Choose your billing method: select an Azure subscription (or create a new one). If you have prepaid Copilot Credits (P3), select that subscription.
5. Set a monthly spending limit for the organization. You can also set per-user limits to prevent any one person from using all the credits.
6. Configure alerts so you get notified when spending hits a threshold.
7. Select Activate.

That's it. Cowork is now available to users with Copilot licenses. The whole setup takes about five minutes.

Optional: Make Cowork discoverable

By default, only users you've enabled through spending policies can see Cowork. If you want everyone to know it exists (even before you've added them to a policy), you can turn on discovery:

1. In the admin center, go to Copilot → Settings.
2. Find AI experiences enabled by usage-based billing.
3. Check the box to Allow users to discover and use AI experiences.

With discovery on, users can see Cowork and request access. You'll get a notification to approve or deny their request.

Optional: Enable browser use

Cowork can use Microsoft Edge to complete tasks on websites (in preview). This is off by default. To turn it on:

1. In the admin center, go to Copilot → Settings → View All → Cowork settings.
2. Under Allow browser access, check Allow Cowork to use the Microsoft Edge browser to perform tasks on behalf of users.

Browser tasks run in a hidden Edge tab using the user's existing sign-ins. Your existing web filtering and Conditional Access policies still apply.

How users find Copilot Cowork

Once an admin has enabled Cowork, here's how users access it:

1. Open Microsoft 365 Copilot at m365.cloud.microsoft, or in the Copilot desktop app, Outlook, or Teams.
2. Look for the Cowork toggle next to Chat at the top of the screen.
3. Switch to Cowork and describe a task in plain language.

If the toggle doesn't appear, Cowork isn't enabled for your account yet. See the troubleshooting section below.

Can't find Copilot Cowork? Here's why

Nine times out of ten, if you can't see Cowork, it's one of these:

What about plugins and models?

Once Cowork is enabled, admins can fine-tune the experience:

• Models: Cowork ships with Claude Opus, Sonnet, and GPT-5.5. Admins can turn off individual models in Copilot settings if needed.
• Plugins: Deploy plugins from Agents → Tools in the admin center. You can push plugins to all users or specific groups.

For most organizations, the defaults work fine. Start with the basics and customize later.

The bottom line

Enabling Copilot Cowork is a five-minute job for an admin: turn on usage-based billing, set a spending limit, and activate. After that, licensed users can find the Cowork toggle in the Copilot app and start delegating tasks. If you're new to Cowork, our complete guide walks you through your first task, and our pricing guide explains what it costs.