Copilot Studio agent – credit consumption and billing clarification

Question

Hi,

I’ve built an agent in Copilot Studio that is not yet published. The agent is connected to the MCP Monday.com connector and the Send Email V2 connector, and it sends emails based on user prompts.

I have an M365 licence and a Copilot licence, and I’d like to clarify the billing and credit usage in the following scenarios:

While the agent is unpublished, do testing actions (connector calls, email sends, etc.) consume credits or incur charges for my organisation?

• Once the agent is published, if the actions are triggered by direct user interaction (for example, prompting the agent to send an email) and remain within the M365 ecosystem, do these calls consume credits or generate charges?

Is credit consumption only applicable when the agent runs fully autonomously (for example, via Power Automate triggers), or does it also apply to interactive scenarios?

I want to understand clearly when credits are consumed and when charges apply, both during testing and after publication.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Answer 1

Hello Daphne Vaia Sioka ,
Testing an unpublished Copilot Studio agent can consume credits because credit usage is based on the actions the agent performs—such as generating responses, calling connectors, sending emails, or running workflows—rather than its publication status. Once the agent is published, direct user-initiated interactions inside Microsoft 365 (for example, in Teams) by users with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license are generally included and do not consume additional credits, even when actions or connectors are involved.
In contrast, autonomous or unattended executions—such as scheduled runs, Power Automate triggers, or background tasks—always consume credits regardless of licensing. The key distinction is that interactive, user-driven usage is included, while agent-driven, autonomous usage is metered.

Q1 — Does testing an unpublished agent consume credits?

Yes. Testing actions (including connector calls and sending emails) can consume Copilot Credits, because usage is measured by actions performed, not publication status.
https://microsoft.github.io/agent-academy/recruit/12-understanding-licensing/

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Q2 — After publication, do user‑initiated interactions inside M365 consume credits?
If the user has a Microsoft 365 Copilot license → No, these actions are included.

If users do not have M365 Copilot licenses, credit consumption follows the regular Copilot Studio model.

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Q3 — Are credits only consumed for autonomous runs?
No. Interactive usage may consume credits depending on user licensing:

• M365 Copilot users → interactive usage is included
• Non‑Copilot users → interactive usage consumes credits
• Autonomous runs → always consume credits

Answer 2

Thank you, this is very helpful.

Just to confirm one point:

For a Copilot Studio agent that is:

• used only internally,

triggered interactively by users, and

used exclusively by Microsoft 365 Copilot–licensed users,

is it correct that:

• Copilot Credits may be consumed for measurement and reporting purposes, but

this usage is included and does not result in billing, regardless of whether the agent is in testing or published?

And that billing applies only when:

• users do not have a Microsoft 365 Copilot license, or
• the agent runs autonomously (for example via scheduled or background execution)?