Microsoft has introduced two new capabilities in Microsoft 365 Copilot aimed at supporting multi-step work across common Office artifacts: Agent Mode within Office apps and Office Agent within Copilot chat. Agent Mode is designed for iterative collaboration inside applications, where a user starts with a prompt and then guides Copilot as it completes a sequence of steps to produce documents, spreadsheets, or presentations.

In Excel, Agent Mode is described as helping non-expert users perform advanced work by generating outputs and then checking results, resolving issues, and repeating steps until the result is verified. Agent Mode can run an analysis on a sales dataset, creating new sheets, selecting formulas, generating visualizations, and providing a summary of insights along with validation steps. In Word, Agent Mode is presented as a conversational drafting experience where Copilot can create content, suggest edits, and ask clarifying questions while applying Word’s native styles and formatting.

Office Agent in Copilot chat, powered by Anthropic models, supports creation of structured PowerPoint decks and researched Word documents starting from a chat prompt. Imagine a workflow where Office Agent clarifies requirements (such as length, theme, and audience), conducts web-based research using deep reasoning capabilities (including a live preview of slides), and uses code generation to produce a ready-to-share presentation while performing quality checks. The rollout details include availability through the Frontier program, with Agent Mode for Excel and Word beginning on the web (desktop coming soon), and Office Agent starting on the web in English for U.S.-based Microsoft 365 Personal, Family, and Premium subscribers.

Who is Agent Mode designed for? 

Agent Mode is for anyone wanting to automate complex tasks and create high-quality Office content directly in the productivity apps they use every day. In Excel, you can consolidate sheets, run what-if scenarios, and generate charts or tables with a single prompt. In Word, you can update regularly used documents with new information, refine and rewrite executive summaries, change formatting and style, and ask for feedback or iterate on content. In PowerPoint (early Frontier access), you can generate multi‑slide edits that stay on‑brand and grounded in web and work sources. 

Links and Resources:

Excel GA blog: https://aka.ms/AgentModeExcelGA

Excel engineering blog: https://aka.ms/agentmodeinexcel 

Agent Mode in Excel support: https://aka.ms/AgentModeExcelSupport

Agent Mode in Word support: https://aka.ms/AgentModeWordSupport