Microsoft 365 Copilot launch sparks backlash over price hike and user issues

zohaibahd

zohaibahd

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The big picture: When Microsoft flipped the switch on its new AI-powered Copilot features for Microsoft 365 earlier this month (formerly Office 365), it might have anticipated celebratory reactions from its millions of loyal subscribers. After all, it's artificial intelligence, apparently the hottest frontier in tech. But not everyone's a fan.

The biggest point of contention was the substantial 30% price increase that accompanied Copilot's rollout.

For the uninitiated, Microsoft announced earlier this month that it was bundling its new Copilot AI features into the Microsoft 365 Personal and Family plans, resulting in a price increase of $3 per month. The monthly cost rose to $9.99 from $6.99, while the annual fee went up to $99.99 from $69.99. Microsoft attributed the hike to the advanced AI capabilities now baked into Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and other apps.

While it had been over a decade since Microsoft last raised rates for its productivity suite, that markup caught many off guard. The lack of clear advance notifications about the changes and price increase also irked customers.

ZDNet's Ed Bott asked Copilot to do the math: A $3 monthly price hike for 84 million subscribers equals $3 billion in extra annual revenue. But at what cost to customer trust?

Now, there are alternative versions of those plans on offer for existing users who have no need for the AI features. But they are only available to existing Microsoft 365 subscribers.

The launch also had other issues that left many users baffled. Some saw phantom pop-ups claiming their subscription rate had inexplicably jumped into the thousands of dollars per month. Others had the Copilot software forcibly installed on their machines, with no clear initial option to disable it.

Further frustration arose from the confusing cross-subscription policies. ZDNet's Ed Bott, who pays for both work and personal Microsoft 365 plans, was essentially blocked from using Copilot features on one of those accounts due to a technical limitation Microsoft apparently didn't properly communicate.

Moreover, most users agree on how terrible Microsoft 365's new name and logo look. As if ditching the "Office 365" branding for "Microsoft 365" wasn't enough, it's further muddied the waters with yet another rebrand to include the word "Copilot."

Had Microsoft introduced this as an opt-in beta, the reception likely would have been much warmer, but that's not to say Copilot 365 lacks potential. There are valid productivity uses for automating rote tasks like text generation and data analysis as these technologies mature.

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Microsoft 365 Copilot launch sparks backlash over price hike and user issues

 
This is EXACTLY why I avoid subscription based software. I actively avoid AI features in its current state, and certainly will not pay extra for the privilege of being a beta tester of a buggy invasive data hoover. My perpetual license for Office 2013 does everything I need at home, and it cost me less than a year of M365.
 
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My employer is considering switch to notion but the contract is not over yet. Government agencies should never use Microsoft products if they are really committed to ensuring national security. I hope Trump can do something about it.
 
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I use LibreOffice and it fits my needs. hasn't failed me yet. Why should I pay for a monthly or yearly subscription when I only use it a few times a year. LibreOffice is open source, is compatible with Microsoft Office, no AI integration, it's private (no cloud), and the biggest thing of them all is it's FREE. It's not a dormant open source program like some other open source programs, it constantly receives updates.
 
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The irony is that the push by Msft for everyone to have NPUs will make it so that you don't need a subscription to get "copilot" in the first place, you could just run a model locally. So much of this AI hype is because it opened up a whole new way for businesses to sell subscriptions. Yes, gen AI can be useful (I use it all the time), but I expect the bubble to start to burst when local models are good and ubiquitous enough to cut out the subscription for most use cases altogether. (Of course, if you have a GPU you can already run many gen AI workloads locally, but for now the cloud based services are still more fully featured than local.)
 
The basic plans are hidden at best and unavailable at worst. Following MS' own instructions on how to downgrade the "basic" plans are not available to me. Fine. Subscription canceled. I can buy office for $65 a PC and I won't have to uninstall OneDrive on every Windows reinstall.

(I tried the opensource office alternatives and they do not work well enough for my work.)
 
deathspeed said:
This is EXACTLY why I avoid subscription based software. I actively avoid AI features in its current state, and certainly will not pay extra for the privilege of being a beta tester of a buggy invasive data hoover. My perpetual license for Office 2013 does everything I need at home, and it cost me less than a year of M365.
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Yeah, no, not having cloud storage just isn’t an option in 2025. And M365 still is the cheapest / TB, even after this ridiculous price increase.

No one buys M365 for Office, especially since the web version is free anyway. It’s all about OneDrive.
 
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bviktor said:
Yeah, no, not having cloud storage just isn’t an option in 2025. And M365 still is the cheapest / TB, even after this ridiculous price increase.

No one buys M365 for Office, especially since the web version is free anyway. It’s all about OneDrive.
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The company I work for has their own cloud servers, we won't use anything like one drive. When we work remotely we essentially just open a VM on company servers through or work laptops.
 
To correct, 3 bucks increase on previous 7 bucks monthly subscription is not a 30% increase. It’s a 43% increase. For people who uses CoPilot, it may make sense. But forcing this on their Office plan is not because Microsoft knows very well that corporations will pay for them. Retail users should just switch to a perpetual license and use another cloud provider.
 
Really sleazy behaviour here.
Just FYI...
You can change this to 'Office 365 Classic' by starting to cancel your subscription on live.com in the manage subscriptions area. You will then get an option to change to this 'classic' version which is at the old price. It is also the old version with nothing different to before. Your subscription will then show as 'Switches to Microsoft 365 Family Classic for [insert local currency here] on [renewal date].
What they have done is update everybody to a version they didn't ask for and quietly hiked the price too without even letting people know. This seems illegal to me at the very least it's really sh1tty.
 
Copilot has potential but the rollout feels rushed and tone-deaf. A beta opt-in would’ve been so much smoother—then people could choose to pay for features they actually want instead of navigating forced updates. The rollout also seems like a missed opportunity to build trust (not new for MS).
 
This feels like a classic case of overpromising and undercommunicating. The $3 monthly hike might not seem like much individually, but at scale, it’s a massive revenue boost... which is what MS was going after. Then again, not great when people didn't ask for more AI features.
 
I purchase 365 Family primarily for the 1TB cloud storage X 6 accounts. Instead of auto-renew, you can get a much better price purchasing a year from a retail outlet when it goes on sale.

$65 for 15 months family plan is the best deal I seen offered recently, Newegg and BuyDig.

That said, this forced Copilot price hike was a terrible move for a product many people aren't keen on to begin with.
 
Now, there are alternative versions of those plans on offer for existing users who have no need for the AI features. But they are only available to existing Microsoft 365 subscribers.
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I am not given any option for O365 classic when trying to change/update/cancel my subscription... I wonder if the offer is also region locked...
 
deathspeed said:
This is EXACTLY why I avoid subscription based software. I actively avoid AI features in its current state, and certainly will not pay extra for the privilege of being a beta tester of a buggy invasive data hoover. My perpetual license for Office 2013 does everything I need at home, and it cost me less than a year of M365.
Click to expand...

I use old Office 10, fully paid for and works GREAT still today! I can't stand the idea of subscription software, it's a ripoff.
 
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Before you shovel AI in your customers, explain what will it do for them or at least just ask if they are interested
current situation is total absurd
 
BadThad said:
I use old Office 10, fully paid for and works GREAT still today! I can't stand the idea of subscription software, it's a ripoff.
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There are other perks with a sub, though some will be useless to many. But with any subscription Defender includes ID theft protection through Experian Premium. That alone costs $25 a month.
 
Libre Office, it's free, open source, and works just as well minus the crap Ai features I didn't care about to begin with. While utilizing the none-subscription versions of M$ Office is an option, it will eventually reach end of life and thus will no longer receive security updates. While Libre Office receives indefinite updates without having to worry about M$ pulling the plug or needing to shell out more money. I switched years ago and have never looked back.
 
bviktor said:
Yeah, no, not having cloud storage just isn’t an option in 2025. And M365 still is the cheapest / TB, even after this ridiculous price increase.

No one buys M365 for Office, especially since the web version is free anyway. It’s all about OneDrive.
Click to expand...
You do you, boo, but this is quite literally the only post I have EVER seen advocating for OneDrive. Maybe it's a generational thing, but I absolutely do not want any of my files in Microsoft's control or possession. I want my files on my drive, that I paid for one time, and that is not likely to be hacked or taken away or used to train AI. At work OneDrive is disabled and we use other solutions for secure file storage and sharing.
 
deathspeed said:
This is EXACTLY why I avoid subscription based software. I actively avoid AI features in its current state, and certainly will not pay extra for the privilege of being a beta tester of a buggy invasive data hoover. My perpetual license for Office 2013 does everything I need at home, and it cost me less than a year of M365.
Click to expand...

Same here. No subscription whenever I can avoid it. Most of the time, you end up paying for something you barely use, just because marketing mumbo jumbo convinced you you needed it!
 
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