Microsoft quietly drops the Copilot+ PC branding on its new Surface devices

[FairDos]

Remember when Microsoft told us that Copilot+ PCs were a whole new category of Windows machine built for AI? Two years on, the new Surface Pro and Surface laptops revealed at the Qualcomm Summit do not carry the Copilot+ name at all. Surface boss Brett Ostrum told Windows Central that these are not called Copilot+ PCs, even though they meet every requirement of the old standard. It has not been formally announced, but the branding looks to be on its way out

For anyone who missed the original push, the label meant a laptop with an NPU capable of at least 40 TOPS for local AI models, plus the dedicated Copilot key. Features like Recall and Cocreator were tied to it. Recall in particular had a rough start after privacy and security concerns forced Microsoft to delay and rework it. That gave the whole category some baggage from day one

Part of the reason is simply that NPUs are now everywhere. Most mid range and premium laptops already have one, so a special badge no longer tells buyers anything useful. Other manufacturers have also been dropping the label, and Nvidia's recent RTX Spark push has not mentioned it either. When everything qualifies, the sticker loses its point

Microsoft is not backing off AI though. Ostrum still talks about AI on the edge and a hybrid approach mixing local and cloud processing. Copilot itself runs on any Windows machine anyway, which always made the naming confusing for regular buyers. There is a Surface and Windows event on October 7, so we may hear more then

My take is that the brand was a marketing exercise that never landed with normal people. Most buyers I know could not tell you what an NPU is or why they needed 40 TOPS. The bigger question is whether the Copilot key survives on keyboards. Did anyone here buy a laptop specifically because it said Copilot+ on the box?

Microsoft stops insisting you need a "Copilot+ PC"arstechnica.com

[Keira72]

Classic Microsoft branding cycle. Launch a name with a huge fanfare, confuse everyone, then quietly bury it two years later. Metro, Windows Phone and now this

[Ivory Cass]

Worth waiting for the October 7 event before reading too much into this. Microsoft might have a new umbrella term lined up for its AI features. They rarely drop a brand without having another ready to go. Anyone shopping for a laptop right now should ignore the badges and compare specs

[EliteShaun20]

It makes sense from a hardware point of view. A 40 TOPS NPU used to be a premium feature and now it is pretty much standard

What I want to know is whether the software requirements change. Will future Windows AI features still check for the NPU or will they fall back to the cloud? That matters more to buyers than the sticker

[NightHarbour]

Dropping a label while keeping the exact same requirements is not much of a change of heart. It is a rebrand of a rebrand, and I bet the next one has AI in the name somewhere

[VioletBadger]

People forget how much the Recall backlash hurt this whole thing. The flagship feature of a brand new product line being pulled over security concerns is a disaster for trust. After that the Copilot+ name was tainted

Microsoft did rework the protections later. Encryption and opt in settings were the right calls. The damage to the brand had already been done though

[RicFlair]

Next on the chopping block has to be the Copilot key. Half the people I know remapped it to something else within a week. It sits where the right Ctrl key used to be on a lot of keyboards, which drove me mad. Give me that key back and I will forgive the rest

[Henry25]

Bought one last year and the only AI feature I use regularly is the background blur on video calls. Recall stayed switched off from day one because I did not want screenshots of everything I do sitting on the drive. The battery life on the Snapdragon chip is excellent though. That was the real selling point for me, not Copilot. Funny how the marketing ended up pushing the least useful part