Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT) is giving Copilot a second brain.
The company said Wednesday it will add Anthropic’s Claude Sonnet 4 and Claude Opus 4.1 to its AI assistant, offering users a choice beyond the OpenAI models that have powered Copilot since launch.
The new options will be available in “Researcher,” Copilot’s reasoning tool, and for building custom agents in Copilot Studio.
Charles Lamanna, who oversees Microsoft’s business Copilot division, said users who opt in can now toggle between OpenAI and Anthropic models inside Researcher.
The change signals Microsoft’s effort to loosen its dependence on OpenAI, even as it remains the start-up’s biggest financial backer.
The move follows earlier announcements that Microsoft will support models from Meta, Elon Musk’s xAI, and China’s DeepSeek within Azure.
The approach highlights a strategy of diversification, balancing its own in-house development with partnerships across the industry, including rivals whose models run on Amazon’s cloud.