Available tools for agents

The new agent experience supports several types of tools that you can add to your agent. Each tool type connects your agent to different kinds of external capabilities and data sources.

Note

Features in this article are powered by the GitHub Copilot harness, which uses Copilot Credits for usage-based billing. Learn more about Copilot Credits in Overview of billing for agents powered by the GitHub Copilot harness.

Usage-based billing applies to using, building, testing, and evaluating agents. These actions might consume Copilot Credits.

Tool types

Choose a tool type based on the systems your agent needs to access and the kind of work it should perform.

Connectors

Power Platform connectors expose actions from hundreds of external services. Your agent can use connector actions to read from and write to systems such as SharePoint, Outlook, Salesforce, ServiceNow, SAP, and more.

Learn more in Use connectors as tools.

MCP servers

Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers provide tools through a standardized protocol. They can expose capabilities from custom services, databases, or internal APIs.

You can connect to existing MCP servers or create your own.

Learn more in Model Context Protocol (MCP) in Copilot Studio overview.

Workflows

Workflows are automated flows built in Copilot Studio's flow designer. They let your agent execute multi-step processes, such as approval flows, data transformations, and complex business logic. Use workflows for repeated, deterministic processes that your agent can run on demand.

Learn more in Agent flows and workflows overview.

Choose the right tool type

Use this guidance to choose the tool type that best matches your scenario.

Tool type Best for
Connectors Integrating with well-known services that have pre-built connectors
MCP servers Custom or internal services using the MCP standard
Workflows Multi-step, automated, deterministic processes
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