Revamp and refine selected text using Draft with Copilot in Word

(Originally posted July 23, 2024 By ~ Angie Miller)

Hello, Microsoft 365 Insiders! I’m Angie Miller, a product manager on the Word team. I’m excited to share improvements to Draft with Copilot in Word for Windows, Mac, and the web. These improvements make it easier to draft and refine text in selected sections of your document.

Use Draft with Copilot in Word to reorganize and polish selected text.

As a writer, you know how difficult it is to consistently produce engaging, high-quality content. You have to research, write, edit, format, and proofread your work with your audience and purpose in mind. You may also need to create new content from existing sources, update content for different contexts, organize content more clearly, and convert content into different formats or languages.

To support these goals, it’s often easier to reference or build on existing content, which is why we’ve added the ability to draft with Copilot in Word, based on text selected in your document.

This feature allows you to:

• Refine or rewrite existing copies.
• Please elaborate or expand on your selection.
• Enhance your content with statistics or other additional information.

How it works

1. Open the existing Word document you want to update.
2. Highlight the part of the document you want to edit.
3. Click on the Copilot icon that appears next to the highlighted text and select it. Make changes

   Change blocks of text using Draft with Copilot.

4. at Drafting with Copilot Enter a prompt describing what you want to change in the text box, then select it. Create button.

   Create a prompt using Draft with Copilot to change a list into paragraphs of text.

5. After Copilot creates new content, you can keep it, delete it, or recreate another version. You can also edit the prompt by clicking the pencil icon.

   Use Draft with Copilot to create prompts that turn lists into paragraphs of text.

Scenarios to try

Coming soon

You can expect this feature to continue to improve over the coming months, including:

• This feature allows you to quickly and directly replace the original selected content with new output.
• Ability to attach and reference additional content from other files (something already possible with Draft in Copilot, using blank documents or line breaks).

We’re also exploring additional features, such as preserving the formatting of the originally selected content or instructing Copilot to apply formatting to newly created content.

As other content types, object types, and features become available in Copilot, the ability to draft selected content in Copilot will also be supported.

Requirements

You must have a Copilot license to use this feature. (For more information about licensing, see consumer and Business.)

effectiveness

This feature is currently rolling out to Word for the web and Current Channel users running:

• Windows: Version 2405 (Build 17628.20110) or later
• Mac: Version 16.86 (Build 24060916) or later

Not yet? It’s probably us, not you.

Features are released over time to ensure everything works smoothly. They are released slowly to a larger number of Insiders, highlighting features you may not have. Sometimes we remove elements based on your feedback to make them even better. This is rare, but we also have the option to completely remove a feature from the product, even if you, as an Insider, had the opportunity to try it out.

feedback

Let us know what you think about your experience using Draft with Copilot in Word! Submit your feedback using the like or dislike icons in the Draft with Copilot interface.

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