Tag Archives: Microsoft

Copilot Studio Licensing Guide

There’s a new (February 2026) Copilot Studio Licensing Guide available. Details of the Agent Pre-Purchase Plan have been added to the ways to buy Copilot Credits. This Azure reservation is a combined way of buying Copilot Credits and Microsoft Foundry services, which you can read more about in our previous blog post here: https://bit.ly/3NSfp7j. A useful nod to the Dynamics 365 Licensing Guide has been added, signposting where to find information about Dynamics 365 licences which include Copilot Credits. Finally, sections on Code Interpreter, Multi-Agent Orchestration, and Bring Your Own Model have been removed from the guide into the Learn documentation.

Grab a copy of the guide here: https://bit.ly/3M59A5W.

Dynamics 365 licensing resources

There are new (February 2026) Dynamics 365 licensing resources now available. The Licensing Guide has a new section covering the Dynamics variant of the MCP Server, outlining which Dynamics 365 licences include access to its capabilities, as a resource for AI tools to interact with enterprise data. An added paragraph clarifies the nuances of the capabilities and licensing requirements when integrating Dynamics 365 Field Service with Project Operations. Finally, the guide is updated to reflect the End Of Sale of Commerce Recommendations and Commerce Ratings.

Grab the Licensing Guide here: https://bit.ly/4ab9LWz and the supplementary Licensing Deck here: https://bit.ly/4kkFrMz.

Power Platform licensing resources

There are updated (February 2026) Power Platform licensing resources now available. The Power Automate Dataverse capacity table on page 21 of the Licensing Guide has been split into two, now providing a separate table for default capacity per tenant and another for accrued capacity per tenant. With the extra space in the tables, information about Dataverse capacity allowances for the Power Automate Hosted Process licence has finally been included. The only other change is that AI Builder Credits information has been removed from tables throughout. However, it’s worth remembering that if you have licences which have these capacities included, then the Credits do remain available until 1 November, 2026. In terms of the Licensing Deck, details of the Agent Pre-Purchase Plan have been added to the ways to buy Copilot Credits. This Azure Reservation is a combined way of buying Copilot Credits and Microsoft Foundry services, which you can read more about in our previous blog post here: https://bit.ly/3NSfp7j.

Grab the updated Licensing Guide here: https://bit.ly/4rpWDT6, and its sidekick, the Licensing Deck, here: https://bit.ly/3Mc5uZx.

Dynamics 365 Commerce Add-ons End of Sale

Microsoft announce the End Of Sale for Dynamics 365 Commerce Recommendations and Dynamics 365 Commerce Ratings and Reviews. These Dynamics 365 Commerce Add-ons, which supplement an eCommerce website with product suggestions and customer reviews, are no longer available for new purchases, with renewals soon to follow suit.

The (somewhat scant) details can be found here: https://bit.ly/3MgpPNl, and here: https://bit.ly/4qlkzWY.

New Defender for Endpoint and Entra ID Add-ons in CSP

Microsoft have introduced two new CSP Add-on licences: Defender for Endpoint Plan 2 for advanced threat protection and Entra ID Plan 2 for advanced identity and access management. These discounted Add-ons are aimed at customers with Microsoft 365 E3, which already includes the Plan 1 capabilities.

CSP partners will see these options on the price list this month, and the announcement can be found here: https://bit.ly/4t9fHXm.

Retirement of standalone SharePoint Online and OneDrive plans

Microsoft have announced the retirement schedule for standalone SharePoint Online and OneDrive (formerly “OneDrive for Business”) plans. Whilst the services remain available in eligible Microsoft 365 suites, new standalone purchases will no longer be permitted after 31 May, 2026. Renewals will still be available until January 2027, after which they’ll remain on existing contracts until the full retirement date in December 2029. You can find the official announcement here: https://bit.ly/4t7THw5.

If you need help on which alternatives to consider, why not try our new Office 365/Microsoft 365 Plan Picker? Find it here: https://bit.ly/PlanPicker.

Power Apps Per App

Microsoft have announced that the Power Apps Per App User SL is no longer available for new customers as of 2 January, 2026. The licence was abruptly removed from the Licensing Guide earlier this month, and this official announcement now provides verification, also clarifying that CSP and EA customers can continue using and renewing existing licences without disruption. MPSA customers, however, can only use existing licenses until their current agreement ends. The Power Apps Per App PAYG option remains available for new purchases, or the Power Apps Premium licence offers an alternative per-user option.

Find the latest Licensing Guide here: https://bit.ly/4qYC0NO, and learn more in the official announcement here: https://bit.ly/4b2TB2m.

Microsoft Defender Experts Suite

Microsoft have launched the Microsoft Defender Experts Suite, a managed extended detection and response (MXDR) service that connects companies with Microsoft’s own security teams to address their cybersecurity needs. Only available through the EA, the suite bundles three offerings: Microsoft Defender Experts for XDR for continual security alert management, Microsoft Incident Response for cyberattack handling, and Microsoft Enhanced Designated Engineering for long-term security optimisation. Two plans are available for customers already licensed with Microsoft 365 E5, the Defender Suite, the Defender Suite FLW, or the Defender + Purview Suite FLW. In addition, there’s a promotion currently running until December 2026 for customers who already have Microsoft 365 E5 or Defender + Purview Suite FLW licenses and who purchase more than 1,500 licences of the new suites.

Find the promo details here: https://bit.ly/4qYe2Cd, compare the plans here: https://bit.ly/3Li4R0n, and check out the useful datasheet here: https://bit.ly/49DSZhj.

Azure Arc-enabled Windows Server benefits

In November 2024 Microsoft made a set of Azure’s server management capabilities free for eligible customers running Windows Server on Azure Arc-enabled machines. If you’re running a Pay-As-You-Go server or it’s covered with licenses with Software Assurance or Software Subscriptions, then services such as Azure Update Manager, Change Tracking and Inventory, and Machine Configuration are included free of charge. Historically, you’ve needed to identify individual eligible servers and then manually activate the benefits, attesting you have the correct licences. Now there’s a new Azure Policy that, when implanted, continuously monitors the Azure Arc environment automatically identifying newly added machines and highlighting those missing the required benefits. It’s then an easy job for an administrator to initiate a remediation task to enable some of all of these servers for the benefits.

Find the announcement article for this new policy here: https://bit.ly/49YRQlz.

Exchange Web Services update

Exchange Web Services (EWS) is a legacy Microsoft API that allows software applications to access and interact with Exchange mailboxes—things like email, calendar, contacts, and folder data. In September 2023 Microsoft announced that EWS would be disabled in Exchange Online in October 2026, advising developers to move to Microsoft Graph. As part of the retirement journey EWS access will be blocked for all mailboxes without rights to EWS from 1 July, 2026. This sounds a bit bizarre, but although Exchange Online Kiosk, Microsoft 365 F3, and Office 365 F3 licenses don’t include EWS rights, restrictions have never been enforced. Note that this date was recently moved from 1 March, 2026 to give customers extra time to remove their dependencies on EWS.

Find the updated announcement article here: https://bit.ly/4jJHitX.