Github Copilot, the Microsoft-owned AI coding assistant for Github, can be costly for some users right away.
On Friday, GitHub announced a “Premium Request” for Github Copilot. This is a new system that imposes rate limits when users switch to AI models other than base models for tasks such as “agent” coding or multi-file editing. Github Copilot subscribers can perform unlimited actions on the base model (GPT-4O in Openai), but tasks and actions using newer models like Anthropic’s 3.7 Sonnet will now be capped.
Copilot Pro ($20 per month) customers will receive 300 monthly premium requests starting May 5th, Github said in a blog post. For Copilot Business and Copilot Enterprise users, you will receive 300 and 1,000 monthly premium requests from May 12th to May 19th, respectively.
Customers of any of these plans can either purchase additional premium requests for $0.04 per request or upgrade to the new Copilot Pro+ plan on GitHub. Copilot Pro+ offers 1,500 premium requests and “access to the best models” starting at $39 per month.
The effective price hike of Copilot’s more capable models occurs the day after AI coding platform Devin has increased the rates for some users, but perhaps reflects the higher computing costs these models experience. 3.7 Inference models like Sonnet take more time to fact-check the answers and increase reliability, but also increase the computing needed to run them.
However, Copilot is not unprofitable. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said last August that Copilot accounted for more than 40% of Github’s revenue growth in 2024, and when Tech Giant acquired it about seven years ago, it was already a bigger business than Github’s everything.