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Stage 5 · Autopilots

Always-on agents that work in the background. Hand a recurring job to a ready-made autonomous agent — Microsoft Scout is the first — that watches, decides, and acts without being prompted each time.

The shift: from "I run an agent when I need it" to "an agent runs for me." Stages 1–4 were all on-demand — you start a chat, call an agent, kick off a recipe, or build a simple one. Autopilots flip the model: the agent is always on, triggered by events and signals rather than a prompt, doing a defined job continuously.

An emerging stage — availability varies

Autopilots are a newer, gated capability. Microsoft Scout — the first Autopilot — is in Frontier private preview, so access is still rolling out by tenant, license, and region. This stage is marked pioneer for that reason: it's real and worth adopting where you have it, but not every user will have access yet. Treat the Microsoft Scout Learn page as the source of truth and re-check before customer-facing claims.

When you're ready for this stage

You've got a job that shouldn't wait for you to start it — monitoring a queue, watching for a signal, keeping something up to date, or kicking off the same follow-through every time an event happens. You've already felt the pull in earlier stages ("an agent will soon do this on autopilot") and now the always-on version exists.

Going the wrong way?

Autopilots are ready-made autonomous agents you adopt, not ones you engineer. If you need real actions against a system of record, custom logic, or org-wide publishing, that's Stage 6 · Copilot Studio. If you just need a simple, on-demand agent for you and a few teammates, that's Stage 4 · Agent Builder.

What you need

  • Access to Microsoft Scout (the first Autopilot) in your tenant — confirm availability with your IT admin, since it's in private preview.
  • A clearly defined, recurring job the agent can own, with a trigger or signal that should set it off.
  • Comfort with delegation: you set the goal and the guardrails, the agent runs continuously.

What Autopilots are

Autopilots are always-on, autonomous agents: each is given a job and a trigger, then runs in the background under its own governed Microsoft Entra identity — noticing when something happens, deciding what to do, and acting on your behalf within the permissions and policies you set. Where an Agent Builder agent answers when you call it, an Autopilot works for you between prompts.

  • ★ Microsoft Scout — the first Autopilot

    An always-on personal agent that builds context over time through Work IQ — introduced June 2, 2026 as the first agent in the Autopilots category, and the focus of this stage.

    What Scout can do today:

    • Coordinate meeting times across time zones, and flag the meetings that matter
    • Generate your prep ahead of time — with you in the loop
    • Identify upcoming deliverables and block calendar time to protect them
    • Spot stalled-decision risks before they become blockers

    ★ First Autopilot Frontier · private preview

    Learn more about Microsoft Scout →

What makes an agent an Autopilot

  • Always-on

    Runs in the background, triggered by events and signals — not by a prompt you type each time.

  • Its own identity

    Acts under a governed Microsoft Entra identity, so everything it does is attributable to it.

  • Acts on your behalf

    Works within the permissions and policies you already have — never beyond your own access.

  • Governed — you stay in the loop

    Sensitive actions can require your sign-off, and Microsoft Purview sensitivity labels and DLP are enforced in the moment.

Scout is the first Autopilot — Microsoft has signaled the category will grow, and as new Autopilots ship they'll join Scout here.

Start here — if you only do three things

You can't fully drive this stage until Scout reaches your tenant — so the first move is to find out where you stand, then line up the recurring job you'll hand off the moment it's switched on.

  • Habit 1Day 1

    Meet Microsoft Scout & what Autopilots are

    Pure learning, no access required — get the category-vs-product hierarchy straight and see what Scout actually does.

    👤 Everyone No access required

  • Habit 2Week 1

    Find out if you can get Scout (and turn it on)

    Confirm Frontier enrollment, the Intune policy + opt-in, and the GitHub Copilot license needed to install the desktop app.

    👤 End user Frontier · private preview

  • Habit 3Month 1

    Hand Scout its first always-on job

    Let Scout coordinate meeting times and prep in the background — under your governed identity, with you in the loop.

    👤 Manager Frontier · private preview

All walkthroughs

These walk you from learning what Scout is, to finding out if you can get it, to handing it its first always-on jobs. Each shows the rough effort and who it's for, so filter by role or time to find your starting point.

Meet the category

Get the hierarchy straight — Autopilots is the category, Scout is the first product — before you turn anything on.

Get set up

Scout is private preview — find out if you're eligible and what has to be true to switch it on.

  • Find out if you can get Scout — and turn it on

    The honest on-ramp: Frontier enrollment, the Intune policy + opt-in attestation, and the GitHub Copilot license needed to install the desktop app.

    ⏱ 15 min 👤 IT admin Frontier · private preview

Hand Scout an always-on job

Once it's on, give Scout a standing job and let it work in the background under your guardrails.

Skills in Autopilots

This is where the Skills Catalog meets always-on agents. A skill is a reusable, packaged capability you save once and reuse — and an Autopilot like Scout is something you can equip with skills so it can carry that task out autonomously.

  • A Cowork recipe (Stage 3) is a skill you describe and run on demand.
  • An Autopilot skill is that same instinct handed to an always-on agent: the capability Scout draws on to do the job in the background, without you starting it each time.

A few illustrative examples of what an always-on agent could be equipped with — the set is emerging and gated, so treat these as the shape of things rather than a finished menu:

  • Inbox & signal triage

    Scout watches for what actually needs you and surfaces it into one short daily brief, so the noise never reaches your desk.

    🧩 Skill · gated

  • Continuous customer-health watch

    The worst-first account-ranking recipe from Cowork, kept always-on so the list is never stale.

    🧩 Skill · gated

  • Meeting recap & follow-through

    Every meeting ends with a clean recap, owned actions, and drafted follow-ups waiting for your sign-off.

    🧩 Skill · gated

That's the honest scope today — the way you equip and manage Autopilot skills is still emerging and gated alongside the rest of the stage, so the catalog keeps the Autopilots (Scout) skills lens scoped to what exists now and will grow as the capability does. See Skills Catalog → Autopilots.

Borrow, don't build

Microsoft owns the authoritative, always-current word on Scout — what it does, how to turn it on, and where it's available. Link to these rather than restating preview details that change.

The full curated set for this stage lives in Resources → Stage 5.

Security at this stage

An Autopilot acts on your behalf, so governance is built in: each agent runs under its own governed Microsoft Entra identity, its access is limited to the resources and destinations you approve, sensitive actions can require human sign-off, and Microsoft Purview sensitivity labels and DLP are enforced in the moment. See the full picture in Security & Governance.

Where this leads

Need an agent that does more than its ready-made job? When you need real actions against a system of record, custom topics, MCP tools, or org-wide publishing and governance, you've outgrown adopting an Autopilot and you're ready to build. That's the low-code destination.

Continue to Stage 6 · Copilot Studio →

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