Tag Archives: Microsoft 365

Modern Work Plan Comparison

The December 2025 Modern Work Plan Comparison documents are now available. Key updates include the addition of Security Compute Units to Microsoft 365 E5 (see our blog post: https://bit.ly/4oUwHgS), the availability of Microsoft 365 Copilot Business as an Add-on to SMB licences, and a correction regarding Office 365 A1 being a valid prerequisite for the Defender Suite and Purview Suite. Separate PDFs for enterprise, SMB, US government, and education sectors can be accessed in our new, searchable Licensing Guides Gallery: https://bit.ly/GuidesGallery, exclusive to our subscribers. Non-subscribers can find them in the usual place here: https://bit.ly/4hn2hS2.

If you’re a partner looking for the Excel version, please email info@licensingschool.co.uk from your work email address and we’ll send it over.

Office 365 and Microsoft 365 features and pricing update

Microsoft announce new features and price adjustments for Office 365 and Microsoft 365, scheduled for 2026.

The updates include incorporating Defender for Office 365 Plan 1 in the E3 licences, integrating more Intune features into Microsoft 365 E3 and E5, and adding 50 GB of mailbox storage to the Microsoft 365 Business plans. These enhancements come with a price increase ranging from 5% to 33% and will impact commercial and not-for-profit customers starting July 1, 2026. US government customers will see similar increases applied (where necessary) in two separate stages.

Details of the new features and price changes can be found here: https://bit.ly/3Mre86j, alongside the government-specific material here: https://bit.ly/4pqBqYy.

Microsoft 365 Copilot Business

Microsoft 365 Copilot Business has been announced! It’s a new plan offering enterprise-grade AI capabilities at a lower price point for SMB customers. It provides the same features as a Microsoft 365 Copilot license, with a cap of 300 users. It’s available as an Add-on to the Microsoft 365 Business Basic/Standard/Premium plans or can be bought bundled with them.

The worldwide launch is on December 1, 2025, with promotional pricing available for certain combinations. The launch announcement can be found here: https://bit.ly/4oNs3C3, and information on the promotions is here: https://bit.ly/3Kd6kEu.

SQL 2025 is now GA!

Microsoft announce the general availability of SQL Server 2025! Unsurprisingly, there’s a heavy focus on its AI-powered enterprise database capabilities, and important updates to security and performance. Other key changes include Power BI Report Server becoming the default reporting solution, no 2025 version of the Web edition, and a new Standard Developer Edition joining the lineup.

The long-awaited announcement can be found here: https://bit.ly/47N1XsO.

Retirement of Office Online Server

Microsoft announce the end of support for Office Online Server, effective December 31, 2026. The software, which lets an organisation use browser-based Office applications from an on-premises server host, won’t receive any more security updates, bug fixes, or technical support from this date. The recommended alternative is, of course, Microsoft 365, for its collaboration, security, and integration with other Microsoft services.

Read the announcement here: https://bit.ly/3JTnTJK.

Microsoft 365 Business Premium for GCC-High

Microsoft introduce Microsoft 365 Business Premium for GCC-High. This offering, aimed at suppliers to US government organisations, provides robust security and compliance features for up to 500 (not 300!) users. It helps meet complex compliance requirements like the CMMC, providing essential enterprise-grade capabilities for smaller organisations in regulated environments.

Find out more here: https://bit.ly/4r4Y6is.

Finance Solution in Microsoft 365 Copilot

Microsoft announce that the Finance Solution in Microsoft 365 Copilot is now generally available. You might have heard of it by a different name since it’s a product that’s already undergone a series of name changes – Copilot for Finance and Finance Agents to name a couple. Now it’s essentially a set of Agents designed to automate various financial tasks across apps like Excel and Outlook, connecting to ERP systems such as Dynamics 365 and SAP. From a licensing perspective, you need to be licensed for Microsoft 365 Copilot and the relevant ERP system.

Find the announcement article here: https://bit.ly/43o2r66.

Modern Work Plan Comparison documents

The Modern Work Plan Comparison documents for November 2025 have been released. These documents now fully reflect the updated names for the Defender and Purview Add-ons and show the reintroduced Office and Microsoft 365 licenses with Teams included. In the SMB comparison, a new footnote confirms a maximum of 300 User SLs across all Business plans combined. Separate PDF files are available for the Enterprise, SMB, US Government, and Education sectors which you can find here: https://bit.ly/4hn2hS2. If you’re a partner, an Excel version of these files is also available.

If you’d like a copy, drop us an email from your work email address to info@licensingschool.co.uk, and we’ll send it on.

Microsoft 365 – Unattended License Overview Licensing Guide

There’s an updated (May 2025) Microsoft 365 – Unattended License Overview Licensing Guidance. If you haven’t come across this document before, it’s got some useful information on how you license a bot to run repetitive tasks in a Windows client or Microsoft 365 App without user intervention. The updates are slightly odd – references to Windows 11 are removed in favour of Windows 10, and it’s not yet updated for the “new” Power Automate licences introduced in August 2023. We’ve got a new section in LicenseVerse – Licensing Guides Cautionary Notes – to keep you informed of errors like this in current Microsoft Licensing Guides.

Help yourself to this May 2025 document here: https://bit.ly/4nDXHBb.

Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat and the Microsoft 365 Apps

The various Copilot offerings have somewhat evolved over time! We have seen Microsoft Copilot become Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat, and there are new features being added all the time. Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat is a collection of AI features, the newest of which is chat functionality within the Microsoft 365 Apps. This means that if you have a valid Microsoft 365 or Office 365 licence, you’ll now find a snazzy sidebar in your apps which is aware of the context of the document you have open, and will provide natural language assistance based on what it sees. No need for a separate Microsoft 365 Copilot licence!

There is more information on the announcement here: https://bit.ly/3DZCgca, along with eligibility criteria here: http://bit.ly/4oycQEb.