Microsoft Excel just got a Copilot function — but the new AI has some surprising limitations

Microsoft hasn't been shy about heavily integrating generative AI across its tech stack, including its wide range of Microsoft 365 productivity tools. This comes after the software giant made a multibillion-dollar investment in OpenAI, granting it access to the ChatGPT maker's next-gen AI capabilities and intellectual property.

More recently, the company announced its plan to integrate its Copilot AI into Microsoft Excel. It's worth noting that the feature is already rolling out in phases to Beta users, which means it could ship to broad availability in the coming weeks or months.

According to Microsoft:

"It can be painful and time-consuming to wrangle data, summarize feedback, categorize information, and brainstorm ideas."

However, integrating Copilot into Microsoft Excel will allow users to use natural language prompts within a spreadsheet, making it easier to interact with the productivity tool while promoting efficiency and effectiveness.

• Summarizing text: Condense long strings or cell ranges into concise summaries.
  For example, =COPILOT("Summarize this feedback", A2:A20)
• Generating sample data: Create placeholder or example data for prototyping or demos.
  For example, =COPILOT("Five ice cream flavors")
• Classifying or tagging content: Assign categories or labels to text entries.
  For example, =COPILOT("Classify sentiment", B2:B100)
• Generate text: Create simple text content.
  For example, =COPILOT("Create a description for this product based on its specs", B2:B8)

While the new feature promises incredible productivity gains for users, Microsoft says it's not a one-size fits all solution for all your Microsoft Excel problems.

Copilot AI in Excel seems like a trivial feature at best

The new COPILOT function in Excel is touted as an incredible tool for classifying, summarizing, and generating content, but that's just about it. Microsoft has categorically warned users against leveraging its capabilities for "any task requiring accuracy or reproducibility," especially numerical calculations (via PC Gamer).

What's more, beyond the accuracy concerns, the feature's usability is capped at 100 calls per 10 minutes or 300 calls per hour. It's also worth noting that you'll not be able to leverage its next-gen capabilities to access live web data or internal business documents.

Perhaps more concerning, this cuts across financial reporting, legal documents, and other high-stakes scenarios, which are essentially the main things people use Excel for so it kind of defeats the purpose.

Microsoft Excel's COPILOT function is pretty limited, which can be attributed to generative AI's tendencies to generate wrong responses to queries, hallucinate, and misleading information.

As listed above, it's important to ensure that the data you're getting from Excel is accurate, but with AI in the fold, things are a tad complicated. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently revealed that he is concerned about the high degree of trust people have in ChatGPT.

Microsoft is also taking extra steps to maintain your data's privacy when interacting with Copilot AI in Excel. According to the software giant:

"Your data sent through the COPILOT function is never used to train or improve the AI models. The information you input remains confidential and is used solely to generate your requested output."

However, some of these limitations could be subject to changes as the new function is still in beta, which means Microsoft could further refine the experience based on feedback from users before it ships to general availability. And finally, you'll also need a Copilot license to leverage this new tool.