The Excel COPILOT Function Is Retired: What Breaks and What to Use Instead
Your old results are still sitting in the cells, which makes the sheet look fine. The next recalculation turns them into #NAME?, so save them first and then replace the function job by job.
Microsoft retired the =COPILOT() worksheet function on September 14, 2026. According to Microsoft's own page for the function, existing results stay in the workbook as cached values, and a cell returns #NAME? when it recalculates, because Excel no longer recognizes the function. Save the results as values first. Then replace each use according to the job it was doing, because no single formula takes over all of them.
What actually happens to your workbook
The function was a preview, offered through the Frontier and Microsoft 365 Insider programs. Plenty of people built on it anyway, because it was the first AI that behaved like a formula. Retirement has three consequences, and the timing is the dangerous part:
- Nothing looks wrong at first. Cached results keep displaying, so a workbook can pass a quick look long after September 14.
- The break arrives later, in someone else's hands. The next person to change a referenced cell, or to force a full recalculation, is the one who sees the error.
- The damage spreads downstream. Any lookup, count or pivot source that reads those cells inherits the problem.
A visible #NAME? is at least honest. The quieter failure comes after the fix: once a column is pasted as values, it looks like live output but will never change again. Mark frozen columns with the date they were frozen, or someone will assume they are still current.
Save the results before anything recalculates
- Press Ctrl+F, click Options, set Look in to Formulas and Within to Workbook.
- Search for
=COPILOT(and click Find All. - Copy the prompts somewhere first. Pasting values discards them, and the prompt is the only record of what the column means.
- Copy the cells and use Paste Special → Values.
- Add a header note such as Classified by COPILOT, frozen 2026-11-01.
What to use instead, by job
This is the order I would work in. Most uses of the function were text jobs, and those have a straightforward answer.
| What the cell was doing | Use now | Watch for |
|---|---|---|
| Classifying or tagging text rows | Copilot pane, then paste as values | Give it a fixed list of labels, then count them to catch invented ones |
| Summarizing feedback or notes | Copilot pane | Read a sample against the source before anyone quotes it |
| Totals, averages, counts in the sheet | SUMIFS, COUNTIFS, a pivot table | This never needed a model |
| Fixed-rule text, such as "contains refund" | IF with SEARCH | Deterministic, free, and it does not drift |
| Business questions about data outside the sheet | A tool that reads that data | The function could only see the ranges you gave it |
The row I would push hardest is the third. Microsoft's documentation for the function told people to use native formulas wherever accuracy or reproducibility mattered, and a total needs both. If a =COPILOT cell was producing a number that another formula read, this retirement did you a favor.
It is also worth knowing the function was never built for a full column. Copying one down a long list ran into a cap of 100 calculations in 10 minutes, which surfaced as a #CONNECT error. Any replacement that calls a model once per row deserves the same question about cost and speed.
Preview features turn into production dependencies without anyone deciding that they should. One person tries something on a Tuesday, it saves an hour, the file gets copied for next month, and a year later it feeds a number in a management pack. Nobody in that chain is careless. The original author knew it was a preview, and the people downstream never knew it existed. When I picked up a critical workbook, the question I learned to ask was not whether the formulas were right. It was which ones depended on something the company did not control.
If you still want AI in a cell
Add-ins fill this gap, and we keep a comparison of Excel AI add-ins with prices. They split into two kinds, and the difference matters more than the brand. Some take a range and run a prompt on it, which is the direct successor for text work. Others take a question and answer it from a dataset, which is a different tool for a different job.
Where =QUIRIZ.ASK fits, and where it does not
Quiriz for Excel is the second kind. You write a question in a cell and the answer comes back from your company's data:
=QUIRIZ.ASK("net sales by month this year", "table")The mode is optional, and you can combine verbose, short, table, notes and chart. The data can be a file you pushed from the workbook or a connected source such as HubSpot, Shopify or QuickBooks, so it does not have to be open in the sheet. Metric definitions live in Company Context, so "net sales" means the same thing in every cell and for every person.
Where it does not replace COPILOT. It takes a question, not a cell range, so =COPILOT("classify this", A2) filled down a column has no equivalent here. If row-by-row text work is what you lost, use the Copilot pane or one of the range-based add-ins. Quiriz is for the number you would otherwise have to go and fetch.
Ask your data from a cell
Try the questions on sample company data first, with no signup, then install the Excel add-in when it answers something useful.
Try Quiriz free →