Automate Basics

Microsoft 365 Copilot vs ChatGPT vs Claude

Pick up to 4 tools and see their free plans, entry prices, platforms and limits in one table. Every fact comes from each vendor's own pages, checked 23 September 2026.

Written head to head: ChatGPT vs Claude, with when to choose each side.

Compared on
Microsoft 365 Copilot

From $21/user/mo

ChatGPT

Free plan · from $8/mo

Claude

Free plan · from $17/mo

What it isAI assistant built into Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and Teams for businessOpenAI's AI chat assistant for writing, research, images, voice and codingAnthropic's AI assistant for writing, analysis, research and coding
Free planNoUnlimited text chats with GPT-5.6 Luna (subject to abuse guardrails); limited uploads, image generation, voice chats, deep research, memory and Codex accessChat on web, desktop and mobile with web search, file creation, code execution, memory, app connections and artifacts; less usage than Pro; no Claude Code or projects
Cheapest paid plan$21/user/mo billed annually (Microsoft 365 Copilot Business (add-on))Microsoft 365 Copilot pricing$8/mo (Go)ChatGPT pricing$17/mo billed annually (Pro)Claude pricing
What it coversAdd-on only for existing customers with an eligible Microsoft 365 Business plan, which is paid for separately. Monthly figure is the monthly-subscription price. A promotional price of $18.00 per user/month (paid yearly) is offered between July 1 and December 31, 2026.Go may include ads. Plus is $20/month. OpenAI's FAQ says Go and Plus are sold as monthly plans; annual plans are for Business and Enterprise.Annual billing is $200 paid up front. Includes Claude Code.
Free trialNone statedNone statedNone stated
PlatformsNot statedWeb, iOS, Android, macOSWeb, iOS, Android, macOS, Windows, Chrome extension, API
Integrations (vendor's figure)Not statedNot statedNot stated
Open sourceNoNoNo
Good for
  • Summarising long email threads and Teams meetings for a small team
  • Drafting proposals and reports in Word from existing files
  • Getting a first-pass analysis of spreadsheet data in Excel
  • Drafting and editing emails, reports and posts
  • Researching a topic with web search and deep research
  • Analysing a spreadsheet or document you upload
  • Drafting and editing long documents and emails
  • Summarising and analysing uploaded files
  • Researching a topic with web search
Watch out for
  • Copilot Business is an add-on: it needs a separate, eligible Microsoft 365 Business plan
  • Business plans cover identity and access management for up to 300 users; larger organisations use the enterprise plan at $30.00 user/month paid yearly
  • A monthly subscription costs 20% more per user than paying yearly ($25.20 vs $21.00 for the add-on)
  • Free and Go have limited uploads, image generation, voice, deep research and Codex access
  • The Go plan may include ads
  • Business plans start at 2 users; Enterprise and Edu pricing requires contacting sales
  • Claude Code, projects and task scheduling are not in the Free plan
  • Usage limits apply on Free and Pro; Max raises them 5x or 20x
  • Enterprise adds usage billed at API rates on top of the seat price
Made byMicrosoft CorporationOpenAIAnthropic

Entry prices are the cheapest paid plan, as each vendor publishes it; “What it covers” says what that price is per (a user, a channel, a brand, a number of contacts). The sources are listed on each tool's page.

Every tool in AI productivity and scheduling tools and AI assistants and chatbots is on their category pages, with the written head-to-heads on Compare.