Copilot in SharePoint September 2026: Key Updates

Introduction

Microsoft has expanded Copilot in SharePoint with new capabilities aimed at making content creation, automation, and AI-assisted work more practical for everyday business use. For IT admins and SharePoint teams, the September 2026 updates are especially important because they improve reuse, governance, and user productivity without requiring heavy custom development.

What’s new in Copilot in SharePoint

Personal skills across SharePoint and OneDrive

Users can now create a personal skill once and reuse it across SharePoint sites and OneDrive. This makes it easier to standardize recurring tasks such as executive summaries, weekly updates, or document briefings without rebuilding prompts for each site.

Skill evaluations and measured improvements

Copilot can now test and evaluate skills, then recommend measured changes to improve results. Instead of manually editing instructions and guessing what works, teams can validate whether updates actually improve quality before sharing skills broadly.

Tenant-specific SharePoint HTML guidance

Every Microsoft 365 customer now has tenant-specific HTML guidance available at _html. AI tools such as GitHub Copilot, Copilot Studio, Cowork, and Scout can reference this page to generate SharePoint-safe HTML that works within the SharePoint sandbox. This should reduce broken output and make it easier to build live reports connected to SharePoint lists.

Image understanding across libraries

Copilot can now analyze images across a document library instead of only working with selected files one at a time. This enables scenarios like reviewing site photos, extracting visible text, identifying equipment, and flagging maintenance issues at scale.

New workflow and approval actions

SharePoint users can now automate Teams messages for file additions or metadata changes, helping teams stay informed where collaboration already happens. Microsoft also added approval-routing workflows tied to files and lists, improving visibility into request status and reviewer actions.

Why this matters for IT admins

• Supports more consistent content generation through reusable skills
• Improves confidence in AI outputs with evaluation-based tuning
• Helps enforce safer SharePoint-compatible HTML experiences
• Expands automation options without requiring custom apps or scripts
• Brings approvals and notifications closer to the content users already manage

Next steps

Admins should review how Copilot in SharePoint fits existing governance and adoption plans, especially around reusable skills and HTML generation. It’s also a good time to test image analysis and workflow scenarios in pilot libraries, then update user guidance for Teams notifications, approvals, and Copilot prompt best practices.

Copilot in SharePoint remains available to users with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license.