Issues with Copilot Studio connector to Azure AI Search

Question

I have a copilot agent in Copilot Studio which is using an Azure AI Search index as a data source. Up until Friday May 16th, it was working fine. Today, when connecting the same search index (vectorized) to my copilot studio and then querying it I get the following error:

Error Message: The output returned from the connector was too large to be handled by the agent. Try reducing its size by utilizing available connector filters or by limiting the number of configured action outputs. Error Code: AsyncResponsePayloadTooLarge

This is telling me Copilot Studio is receiving the response differently than it used to several days ago

1. Is there a new workaround to get around this, my solution requires Azure AI Search as the data source?
2. If there isn't, what is the timeline to get the connector to behave again?
3. Are there actual connector filters available for the AI Search service connector? or is the error implying I have to manually create a power automate/copilot set of actions to filter the response? If so, how can this be done given the response is too large to even retrieve?

Please provide me answers for my questions, not just links to the documentation, I've read the documentation and there is no solution there for this issue

Answer 1

Hi Shabash, Boris , Marco Riezzo

I’ve analyzed the issue where our Copilot agent, which connects to Azure AI Search, is now failing with the following error:

“The output returned from the connector was too large to be handled by the agent.” Error Code: AsyncResponsePayloadTooLarge

---

What’s Causing This?

This error is the result of recent changes in Copilot Studio (around May 2024) that enforce stricter limits on how much data it can process from connectors like Azure AI Search. When too many results or large content fields are returned, Copilot stops processing and throws this error.

This is expected behavior going forward and not a temporary bug.

---

What You Can Do to Fix It:

Option 1 – Limit Data Using Azure Search Query Parameters

You can reduce the response size by adjusting your Azure Search query. The two key options are:

$top: Limits how many records are returned.

$select: Lets you pick only the fields you actually need (e.g., title, summary).

Sample Query:

http

https://<your-search-service>.search.windows.net/indexes/<your-index>/docs
?api-version=2023-11-01-preview
&search=your-query
&$top=3
&$select=title,summary

This keeps the response compact and avoids exceeding Copilot’s payload limits.

References:

Query Parameters for Azure Cognitive Search

Azure Cognitive Search REST API

---

Option 2 – Use Power Automate to Control the Response

If you need more flexibility or need to further reduce the response before Copilot receives it, you can create a Power Automate flow. This method allows you to:

Call Azure Search within the flow

Use filters and limit the fields/records

Format the output and return only what's essential

This helps keep the response lightweight and under the size limit.

References:

Copilot Studio and Power Automate Integration

Power Automate: Using HTTP Actions

---

Additional Points:

There is no patch or fix planned from Microsoft — this behavior is permanent.

Azure AI Search doesn’t support built-in filters in Copilot, so we have to manage that at the query or flow level.

• Avoid returning full documents or unnecessary metadata — these are often what push the response over the limit.

---

Thanks,  

Karan Shewale.  

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Answer 2

Steps which i followed to solve the problem:

1. Created custom connecter to fetch top 5 result.

• Add a tool -> Connector -> Search (Hybrid semantic search) -> apply all the filter you want
  

3. Created a tool called Prompt(Answer based on given question and data)

1. And then printed the response
   

Answer 3

1.You can find the tool like this -

You can search - Provide answer based on given question