Guides / Comparisons

ChatGPT vs Microsoft Copilot: Which AI Assistant Should You Use?

ChatGPT vs Microsoft Copilot compared: plans and prices as of October 2026, Office integration, work data, image creation and who each one suits.

Mythex Team · 2026-10-22 · 8 min read

Pick Microsoft Copilot if your day happens inside Microsoft 365: it works in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and Teams, and on business plans it can answer from your work email, files and meetings. Pick ChatGPT if you want the strongest general-purpose assistant that works across many tools, with its own coding agent (Codex), image creation and add-ins that now reach into Word, Excel and PowerPoint too. As of October 2026 both have a free tier, and the main personal plans cost about $20 a month: ChatGPT Plus is $20 and Microsoft 365 Premium is $19.99, which also includes the Office apps.

ChatGPT vs Copilot at a glance

Prices are US dollars as of October 2026, from ChatGPT Business pricing, OpenAI's Plus, Go and Pro help pages, and Microsoft's individual, business and enterprise Copilot pricing pages.

How we compared

We read each company's own pricing pages and help articles in October 2026 and compared what they state: plans, prices, which apps each assistant works in, how it uses your data, and what extras are included. We did not run benchmarks or score answer quality. Both products change models and limits often, and both meter heavy features, so check usage limits on your own account. Where we couldn't confirm a detail on the vendor's site, we left it out.

What each one actually is

ChatGPT is OpenAI's assistant. You use it in a browser, the desktop app or on your phone for writing, research, analysis, images and code. Around the chat sit Codex (OpenAI's coding agent), image creation, deep research, file uploads and memory. OpenAI's ChatGPT for Word help page says one Microsoft add-in brings ChatGPT into Word, Excel and PowerPoint, on all plans including Free.

Microsoft Copilot is Microsoft's assistant, sold in two quite different ways:

• For individuals, Copilot comes with Microsoft 365 Personal, Family, Premium and Pro, and works inside Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and OneNote. On Family and Premium, the AI features are for the subscription owner only.
• For organisations, Microsoft 365 Copilot adds AI chat grounded in your business data, Copilot in Office apps and Teams, pre-built agents such as Researcher and Analyst, and admin controls. Microsoft says some advanced features (Cowork, Autopilot, agent usage) are billed by usage on top of the licence.

The key difference: ChatGPT is a general assistant that can reach into your apps. Copilot is part of your Microsoft 365 apps and can see the work data already stored there.

Pricing for individuals

ChatGPT

As of October 2026:

• Free: $0. Unlimited everyday text chats, with separate, lower limits on images, file uploads and data analysis.
• Go: $8/month. Higher limits than Free for images, file uploads and data analysis, plus a larger context window.
• Plus: $20/month. Priority access, higher model limits, voice, image generation, file uploads, deep research where available, and Codex on the web, CLI, IDE and iOS.
• Pro: $100, $200 or $500/month, with more usage at each step. OpenAI says Pro is billed monthly only.

OpenAI's help pages say annual billing isn't available for Go, Plus or Pro.

Microsoft 365 with Copilot

As of October 2026, billed monthly:

• Microsoft 365 Personal: $9.99/month. One person, 1 TB of storage, Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook with Copilot, and higher Copilot usage than the free tier.
• Microsoft 365 Family: $12.99/month. Up to 6 people and 2 TB shared, but Copilot is for the subscription owner only.
• Microsoft 365 Premium: $19.99/month. Everything in Family plus "extensive" Copilot usage, more image creation and limited agentic research features.
• Microsoft 365 Pro: $99.99/month, monthly only. 5 TB and the highest Copilot usage.

Microsoft says yearly billing saves up to 17% on these plans.

The honest read: if you'd pay for Microsoft 365 anyway, Copilot is close to a bonus. Premium costs about the same as ChatGPT Plus and includes the Office apps and storage. If you don't need Office, ChatGPT Plus gets you more AI per dollar for writing, research and coding.

Pricing for teams

ChatGPT Business is $20 per user per month billed annually, or $25 monthly, for teams of 2 to 200. A premium seat with 5x the usage is $100/month annually or $125 monthly. OpenAI lists SAML SSO, MFA, connectors to Google Workspace, Slack, GitHub and Microsoft 365, and no training on your business data by default.

Microsoft 365 Copilot comes in a few shapes as of October 2026:

• Microsoft 365 Copilot Business (add-on): $18 per user/month paid yearly. Microsoft marks this as a promotion from $21 that runs July 1 to December 31, 2026, applies to the first year only, and needs an eligible Microsoft 365 business plan.
• Microsoft 365 Business Standard with Copilot: $23.50 per user/month paid yearly, including the Office apps, business email and Teams.
• Microsoft 365 Business Premium with Copilot: $32 per user/month paid yearly, adding advanced security.
• Microsoft 365 Copilot for enterprise (add-on): $30 per user/month paid yearly, on top of a qualifying Microsoft 365 plan.
• Copilot Chat: included at no extra cost for work accounts with an eligible Microsoft 365 subscription, with agents billed on a metered basis.

If you're on Microsoft 365 already, start with the free Copilot Chat, see who uses it, and only buy full Copilot seats for those people.

Where each one is stronger

Copilot is stronger at

• Answering from your work data. On business plans, Copilot is grounded in Microsoft 365: "summarise what I missed in this Teams channel" or "draft a reply using last week's thread" works because it can see that data.
• Living in the apps you already use. Copilot in Outlook, Teams, Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote means no switching windows.
• IT and compliance fit. Microsoft lists Enterprise Data Protection, admin analytics and management in the same admin centre as the rest of Microsoft 365.
• Value if you need Office anyway. Personal and Premium plans bundle the apps and storage.

ChatGPT is stronger at

• General-purpose work outside Office. Brainstorming, research, long-form writing and data analysis in one place, on any device.
• Coding. Codex is part of every ChatGPT plan, and Plus adds it on the web, in the CLI, in your editor and on iOS. Microsoft's coding assistant, GitHub Copilot, is a separate subscription; see our GitHub Copilot vs Cursor comparison.
• Mixed tool stacks. If your team uses Google Workspace, Slack and GitHub as well as Microsoft apps, ChatGPT Business connects to all of them.
• Images. ChatGPT Images can create and edit images on all tiers, including text in images and selective edits.
• Your Office files without a Microsoft 365 Copilot licence. The ChatGPT add-in works in Word, Excel and PowerPoint on any ChatGPT plan, though it can't reference other files on your computer.

Privacy and data

For business use, both state that your data isn't used to train their models by default: OpenAI says this for ChatGPT Business, and Microsoft lists Enterprise Data Protection on its Copilot business plans. On personal ChatGPT plans, OpenAI says conversations may be used to improve models and that you can opt out in Data Controls. Read each provider's data terms for your plan before pasting in client or company information.

Which should you pick?

Many people end up with both: Copilot for email, meetings and documents at work, and ChatGPT for everything else. That's a reasonable setup if your employer pays for one.

When neither assistant is the answer

Assistants are good at one-off tasks: a draft, a summary, a formula. They're weaker when the same job repeats every day with the same steps, such as turning form submissions into quotes, or tracking client requests through stages. Pasting the same prompt into a chat each morning is a sign you need a small tool instead.

That's where an AI app builder like Mythex fits. You describe the tool in chat, see it running in a live preview, and publish it to a URL in one click, with a database, sign-in and file storage when the app needs them. You can also put AI inside the tool itself, so the drafting or summarising happens on a button rather than in a chat window; our guide on how to add AI features to your app shows how. Mythex Free gives 5 credits a day and Pro starts at $25 a month (see pricing). For ordinary writing and research, ChatGPT or Copilot is still the better and cheaper choice.

Before you choose

1. List where your work lives. Mostly Microsoft 365, or spread across tools? That decides more than model quality.
2. Try the same three tasks in both. A real email reply, a spreadsheet question and a one-page summary.
3. Check what you already pay for. Many work accounts include Copilot Chat, and many households already have Microsoft 365.
4. Watch for usage-based extras. Microsoft bills some advanced Copilot features by use, and ChatGPT meters heavy features with credits.

If you're choosing an assistant to help build software rather than write documents, read ChatGPT vs Claude vs Gemini for building apps. For what's happening under the hood of both, see what is an LLM.