Copilot vs Gemini

Copilot wins for Office users at USD 9.99 a month; Gemini wins for Gmail and Docs users and long files, with 1M tokens on AI Pro at USD 19.99. Teams follow the same split: Microsoft 365 Business Standard with Copilot is USD 23.50 per user a month, Google Workspace Business Standard USD 14.

• Your day runs in Word, Excel and Outlook. Every paid Microsoft 365 plan lists the Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook desktop apps with Copilot built in, plus Copilot in Teams.
• You want Office and AI for the price of one subscription. Microsoft 365 Personal costs USD 9.99 a month with 1 TB of OneDrive, Defender and the desktop apps, which is half the price of AI Pro.
• You pay yearly. Microsoft lists savings of up to 17% on annual billing for Personal, Family and Premium. Google's subscriptions page lists monthly prices only.
• You want a choice of models. Microsoft's Copilot privacy overview says you can choose between leading AI models for different kinds of work.

• Your mail and documents are in Google. Google AI Pro adds Gemini in Gmail, Docs and Vids, and Google's plan page lists Gemini in Chrome among the benefits.
• You work with long files. Google's limits and feature availability page lists a 1M token context on AI Pro and AI Ultra, which Google says covers up to 1,500 pages of text.
• You want a cheap first upgrade. AI Plus at USD 4.99 a month doubles the free usage limit and adds a 128k context.
• You analyse audio and video. Google's file upload help page allows 2 GB per video, with total video length raised from 5 minutes to 1 hour on AI Pro and AI Ultra.

Both have a free tier, a main paid plan at USD 19.99 a month and a heavy-use plan at USD 99.99 a month. Both bundle cloud storage, both run research tasks across the web, and both generate images. Both assistants sit inside a productivity suite rather than standing alone, so the suite you already pay for decides most of the value. Both companies sell separate business editions with admin controls, and both apply different data terms to work and school accounts than to personal ones.

Microsoft Copilot

• Best for: people and small firms that already live in Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook.
• Main limitation: Microsoft does not publish context sizes or usage numbers on its plan pages, and on Family, Premium and Pro the AI features belong to the subscription owner only.
• Price or plan limits (checked 23 October 2026): Free; Personal USD 9.99, Family USD 12.99, Premium USD 19.99, Pro USD 99.99 a month; up to 20 files per conversation, 50 MB each.

Google Gemini

• Best for: people whose working files sit in Gmail, Docs and Drive, and anyone feeding long documents to a chatbot.
• Main limitation: limits are compute-based and change with prompt complexity, so the same plan allows fewer heavy prompts, such as Deep Research or video, than light ones.
• Price or plan limits (checked 23 October 2026): Free; AI Plus USD 4.99, AI Pro USD 19.99, AI Ultra USD 99.99 or USD 199.99 a month; up to 10 files per prompt, 100 MB each.

For a business, the comparison is between two suites, not two chatbots.

Microsoft. The Copilot business pricing page lists three routes. The Microsoft 365 Copilot Business add-on costs USD 18 per user a month paid yearly, down from USD 21, or USD 25.20 on a monthly subscription. Microsoft 365 Business Standard with Copilot costs USD 23.50 per user a month paid yearly, and Business Premium with Copilot costs USD 32. Microsoft also includes Copilot Chat, a web-grounded assistant with Copilot in Outlook, at no extra cost with eligible Microsoft 365 plans.

Google. Google Workspace pricing builds Gemini into the suite price. Business Starter at USD 7 per user includes Gemini in Gmail and limited Gemini in Workspace apps. Business Standard at USD 14 adds Gemini in Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drive, Meet and Chat, plus 2 TB of pooled storage per user. Business Plus costs USD 22. Starter, Standard and Plus are capped at 300 users. Google sells Gemini Enterprise separately from USD 21 per seat a month for teams that want agents and connectors to tools like Microsoft 365, HubSpot and Jira.

Microsoft 365 Business Standard with Copilot costs USD 23.50 per user a month paid yearly, according to Microsoft's business pricing page on 23 October 2026.

Google Workspace Business Standard costs USD 14 per user a month with Gemini in Gmail, Docs and Meet, according to Google's Workspace pricing page on 23 October 2026.

Gemini in Meet also takes meeting notes on Business Standard and above. If notes are your main use, compare it with dedicated tools in our AI meeting assistant rankings. For a staged rollout either way, read our guide to rolling out AI for teams.

Google publishes more of the numbers that decide whether a long task finishes. Its limits page lists a 32k token context without a plan, 128k on AI Plus and 1M on AI Pro and AI Ultra. Usage refreshes every 5 hours until a weekly cap, and paid users who hit the cap can continue with Flash-Lite. Audio uploads run to 10 minutes in total on most plans and 3 hours on AI Pro and AI Ultra.

Microsoft's file upload help page applies to every Copilot experience, from free Copilot Chat to Microsoft 365 Pro: up to 20 files in one conversation and up to 50 MB per file, in PDF, DOCX, XLSX, PPTX, image and text formats. The same page says uploaded files are deleted within 18 months. Microsoft's plan pages describe Copilot usage only as "higher usage than free", "extensive usage" or "highest usage".

Google AI Pro lists a 1M token context window, about 1,500 pages of text, according to Google's Gemini limits page on 23 October 2026.

Our context windows explainer shows how token counts map to pages and files.

1. Pick three tasks you repeat: a reply drafted from a long email thread, a summary of a 30-page document and a chart built from a spreadsheet.
2. Set privacy first: switch off Keep Activity in Gemini and review the personalization switches in Copilot before uploading anything sensitive.
3. Run each task inside the suite you use. Try Copilot in Word or Outlook and Gemini in Docs or Gmail, not only in the chat apps.
4. Count corrections: wrong figures, missed attachments and invented sources count more than tone.
5. Note the first limit you hit: a file cap, a usage message or a missing feature on your plan.

See also our ChatGPT and Copilot comparison, ChatGPT and Gemini comparison, Gemini review and AI chatbots shortlist.

Data controls compared