November 21, 2025
WHAT'S HAPPENING: Microsoft 365 E5 Security & Compliance Add Ons Rebranded
WHEN: October 1, 2025
Microsoft has renamed its Microsoft 365 E5 mini-suites. Microsoft 365 E5 Security is now the Microsoft Defender Suite, and Microsoft 365 E5 Compliance is the Microsoft Purview Suite. There are no changes to the features included in each:
Microsoft Defender Suite
Entra ID P2: Risk-based conditional access, visibility into risky sign-ins and user behavior anomalies. ID Governance and Privileged Identity Mgmt.
Defender for Identity: A cloud-based identity security solution that uses your on-premises Active Directory signals to identify, detect, and investigate advanced threats, compromised identities, and malicious insider actions directed at your organization.
MDO P2: Advanced email and collaboration security with automated investigation and response, and end user phishing simulation trainings.
MDE P2: Endpoint security and EDR with advanced threat hunting, and access to threat experts for more investigations.
Defender for Cloud Apps: SaaS security solution to automatically discover and block apps based on risk level, unusual user activity, or data-sharing behavior to protect against sophisticated SaaS-based attacks.
Microsoft Purview Suite
Automatically discover, classify and label sensitive data, and prevent its unauthorized use across apps, services, and devices with integrated Information Protection and DLP.
Understand user intent around use of sensitive data and defend against insider risks with Insider Risk Management and Adaptive Protection to automatically adapt policies based on risk level.
Protect Microsoft 365 Copilot data from accidental oversharing, data leaks, or noncompliance usage.
Drive adherence to common industry and regional regulations (for example EU AI Act, ISO, etc.) with prebuilt templates in Compliance Manager.
Streamline your response to events and investigations with Audit retention policies and Audit insights and drive investigation efficiencies with eDiscovery workflows and analytics.
WHAT'S HAPPENING: Release of SQL Server 2025
WHEN: November 18, 2025
With the release of SQL Server 2025, Microsoft has made the following changes to the product lineup:
Standard edition changes: Resource limits have increased to support up to 32 cores and 256 GB of memory. Resource governor is now available in Standard edition. The newly launched Standard Developer edition offers full feature parity with the Standard edition, enabling development and testing that mirrors production environment capabilities. Power BI Report Server entitlement is now included for all editions except the Express edition, adding value for customers.
Express edition changes: The maximum database size is now increased to 50 GB per database. The Express Advanced mode has been consolidated into a single, unified SQL Express edition, featuring all feature capabilities that were available in Express Advanced.
Discontinuing Web edition in SQL Server 2025 release: SQL Server 2022 is the final version of the Web edition, with SQL Server 2022 Web edition remaining supported until January 2033 in line with Microsoft’s fixed lifecycle policy. If you've been using the Web edition for cost-effective web applications, now is a great time to consider migrating to Azure SQL. Azure SQL offers an affordable, scalable solution that is well-suited for modern web workloads. For multi-tenant apps, Azure SQL Database elastic pools provide flexible pricing and easy management, making the move to Azure SQL a smart choice for future growth. If you remain on-premises or use Azure SQL Virtual Machines, upgrade to the Standard edition.
WHAT'S HAPPENING: Microsoft Security Copilot (with built-in agents) is now included in Microsoft 365 E5
WHEN: November 18, 2025
Starting November 18, 2025, Microsoft Security Copilot (with built-in agents) is now included at no additional cost for all Microsoft 365 E5 customers. Agents are embedded across Microsoft Defender, Microsoft Entra, Microsoft Intune, and Microsoft Purview, enabling AI-driven security workflows without requiring separate add-on licenses. Each E5 tenant receives 400 Security Compute Units (SCUs) per month per 1,000 user licenses, capped at 10,000 SCUs/month, sufficient for typical usage scenarios.
WHAT'S HAPPENING: New Microsoft 365 Copilot Business offer announced
WHEN: December 1, 2025
Microsoft is launching Microsoft 365 Copilot Business on December 1, 2025 for businesses with under 300 users. Microsoft 365 Copilot Business delivers the same AI-powered productivity features as the current Copilot SKU (available for 30 USD), at a more accessible price point for SMBs.
Price: 21.00 USD per user per month
License cap: Up to 300 users
Requires: Microsoft 365 Business Basic, Standard, or Premium license
WHAT'S HAPPENING: New Copilot offers for Microsoft education customers
WHEN: December 1, 2025
Microsoft is introducing AI-powered teaching and learning features at no additional cost for existing Microsoft 365 education customers, while also launching an academic Copilot offering priced at $18 (USD MSP) per user per month, starting December in 2025. This paid add-on unlocks full Copilot capabilities across Microsoft 365 apps and integrates with Learning Management Systems, complementing free features like “Teach” and “Study and Learn” modules included in A-SKU education plans.
WHAT'S HAPPENING: Change to Timeline for Simplified License Management for Dynamics 365 Products
WHEN: January 15, 2026 As previously announced, Microsoft is going to be making changes to Dynamics 365 licensing management. The dates for the transition has been amendment as follows:
Starting January 15, 2026, license validation for Dynamics 365 finance and operations applications will begin for customers with contract renewals or anniversaries occurring after that date. Dynamics 365 finance and operations customers must assign the required user licenses through the Microsoft 365 admin center for the following apps:
- Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance
- Microsoft Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management
- Microsoft Dynamics 365 Commerce
- Microsoft Dynamics 365 Project Operations
- Microsoft Dynamics 365 Human Resources More information is available in the released FAQ
WHAT'S HAPPENING: Visual Studio 2026 Release
WHEN: November 11, 2025
Visual Studio 2026 introduces major performance improvements, a redesigned UI, and deep AI integration (including Copilot agents for debugging and profiling), while maintaining full compatibility with Visual Studio 2022 projects and extensions. The licensing model remains unchanged: existing subscription tiers (Professional, Enterprise, and monthly cloud subscriptions) are the same as previous versions.
WHAT'S HAPPENING: Finance solution in Microsoft 365 Copilot now generally available
WHEN: October 20, 2025
The Finance solution in Microsoft 365 Copilot, formerly Microsoft Copilot for Finance, is now generally available. The Finance solution is built on Microsoft 365 Copilot, so you must have an active Microsoft 365 Copilot license in addition to a qualifying Microsoft 365 subscription (e.g., E3, E5, Business Standard, or Business Premium). To enable ERP-connected workflows (e.g., reconciliation, variance analysis), you need licensing for the relevant ERP system such as Dynamics 365 Finance or SAP, since Copilot retrieves governed data from these systems.
WHAT'S HAPPENING: AI Builder Credits being phased out and replaced with Copilot Credits
WHEN: November 1, 2026
AI Builder credits were available as capacity packs (AI Builder capacity add-ons) which provided 1 million AI Builder credits, and as seeded capacity in Power Platform licenses, like Power Apps premium licenses, or Power Automate premium licenses.
Both AI Builder capacity add-ons and seeded credits in premium licenses are impacted by this end of AI Builder credits. Existing 'add-ons' customers will retain access to their AI Builder credits coming from AI Builder add-ons until their AI Builder add-ons contracts expire. Existing 'seeded' customers will retain access to their AI Builder credits coming from seeded premium licenses up to November 1, 2026. The seeded AI Builder credits from licenses like Power Apps Premium or Dynamics 365 will remain usable (on a monthly basis) until November 1, 2026, based on the number of active licenses.
After Nov 1, 2026, these seeded credits will be removed for all new and existing customers, including those with an Enterprise Agreement. Copilot Studio Credits will be required for continued access (or active AI Builder add-ons).
WHAT'S HAPPENING: Copilot Credit Pre Purchase Plan available
WHEN: November 1, 2025
Microsoft has now released a pre-purchase plan for Copilot Credits. Pre-purchase plans are commit units (CUs) bought at discounted tiers in your purchasing currency for a specific product. The more you buy, the greater the discount. Purchased CUs pay down qualifying costs in US dollars (USD). The Copilot Credit pre-purchase plan automatically uses your CCCUs to pay for eligible Copilot Credit usage during its one-year term or until Copilot Credit CUs run out. Your pre-purchase plan Copilot Credit CUs start paying for your Copilot usage without having to redeploy or reassign the plan. By default, plans are configured to renew at the end of the one-year term. The plan is purchased via Reservations in the Azure portal.
WHAT'S HAPPENING: Cross-region Disaster Recovery for Frontline in dedicated mode is now generally available
WHEN: September 10, 2025
Cross-region Disaster Recovery for Windows 365, which was previously only available for Enterprise, is now available for Windows 365 Frontline as well. This Windows 365 add-on feature creates “snapshots” of Cloud PCs in customer-defined, geographically distant locations. In the event of a regional outage, these snapshots can be recovered as Cloud PCs running in the selected backup location, helping keep your users productive even if their primary region goes down. Windows 365 Cross-region Disaster Recovery is provided as an add-on license to Windows 365 Enterprise and Windows 365 Frontline. It is not currently available for any other Windows 365 offering.
WHAT'S HAPPENING: Microsoft Defender Threat Intelligence will be made available at no charge to Defender XDR and Microsoft Sentinel customers
WHEN: August 1, 2026
Microsoft Defender Threat Intelligence (MDTI) is being integrated into Microsoft Sentinel and Defender XDR, providing unified, real-time threat intelligence at no additional licensing cost, effectively eliminating the need for separate MDTI licenses. Existing MDTI customers will retain access to their current experience until August 1, 2026, after which they will transition to the new unified model without extra charges, with most features included under existing Microsoft 365 E5 or equivalent security licenses. While core threat intelligence capabilities will be free, Sentinel customers may incur data ingestion costs for certain advanced features like IoC-based alerting, but there is no minimum ingestion fee. You can read more here.
WHAT'S HAPPENING: Viva Pulse services now added to Viva Glint licenses
WHEN: October 1, 2025
In October 2025, Microsoft added the Pulse service plan to all Glint licenses with no price increase. Now, if a user has a Glint license assigned to them, they will also be assigned a Pulse license
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