As of June 1, 2026, GitHub Copilot no longer bills the way it used to. The old "premium requests" system is gone, replaced by GitHub AI Credits — usage-based pricing metered at the token level. For technical teams across Morocco and Africa that have woven Copilot into their daily workflow, this is not an accounting footnote. It is a shift that can turn a stable budget line into a variable expense that is hard to forecast.
Here is what actually changed, why it matters for your cash flow, and the decisions worth making this week to avoid an unpleasant surprise at month's end.
What Changed on June 1, 2026
Until now, every Copilot plan included a quota of "premium requests": a fixed number of calls to the advanced models. You knew exactly what you were paying for. That model is over.
In its place, GitHub introduced AI Credits. The principle is simple on paper: each plan includes a monthly allowance of credits, and consumption is now measured by actual usage, token by token. The conversion is fixed and easy to remember: 1 AI Credit equals $0.01. So a $10 budget corresponds to 1,000 credits.
Usage is calculated from input tokens, output tokens, and cached tokens, according to the published API rates for each model. A powerful model costs more credits per interaction than a lightweight one. It is exactly the logic of a meter: the more intelligence you call on, the faster the needle turns.
There is good news for keeping the bill in check: code completions and Next Edit suggestions remain included in every plan and do not consume credits. The most common everyday use — autocomplete as you type — stays free. It is the agentic features and exchanges with advanced models (chat, automated refactoring, agents) that now eat into the meter.
The 2026 Plan Pricing
The base subscription prices do not move, but what they include does:
| Plan | Monthly price | Included credits | |------|--------------|------------------| | Copilot Pro | $10/month | monthly allowance | | Copilot Pro+ | $39/month | $39 in credits | | Copilot Business | $19/user/month | $19 in credits | | Copilot Enterprise | $39/user/month | $39 in credits |
Beyond the included allowance, paid plans can purchase additional usage. That is precisely where the risk lives: a team that adopts Copilot agents heavily can blow past its allowance without noticing.
One important transition detail: users on a monthly Pro or Pro+ plan migrated automatically to usage-based billing on June 1, 2026. Those on an annual plan keep the old premium-request model until their subscription expires. If you paid yearly, you have a reprieve — use it to prepare.
Why It Matters for Your Business
Moving from a fixed cost to a variable one is not neutral for an SME or a startup. Three concrete consequences deserve your attention.
Budget predictability disappears. A $19-per-developer subscription was a simple line to model. With usage-based consumption, two developers on the same plan can generate very different bills depending on how intensely they use the agents. For a team of ten, the gap between a quiet month and a busy one can be significant.
Dollar exposure rises. Billing is in US dollars. For a business that earns in dirhams, every exchange-rate swing hits the invoice. At roughly 10 dirhams to the dollar, a $39 allowance is close to 390 dirhams per user — before any overage. Multiplied across a team and across months, currency becomes one more variable to watch.
Developer behavior becomes a cost center. Before, how a developer used Copilot had no financial impact. Now, running an agent over a large codebase, chaining requests to the most expensive models, or letting long tasks run costs real money. Team culture has a price tag.
This is the kind of call where an outside perspective helps you decide quickly. A digital consulting engagement can frame a usage policy before the bill drifts.
What to Do Now: The Action Plan
1. Measure your real consumption
Before any decision, look at the data. GitHub provides consumption tracking by user and by model. Identify who uses what, and especially which agentic features run the most. You will probably discover that 20% of usage drives 80% of the credits consumed.
2. Set a spending cap
Usage-based plans let you define a limit. Set a monthly cap per team or per project, aligned with your dirham budget converted with a safety margin on the exchange rate. A slightly low cap you raise as needed beats a surprise invoice.
3. Separate free usage from paid usage
Remind your team that autocomplete stays free. Reserve agents and advanced models for high-value tasks: generating complex tests, large-scale refactoring, exploring an unfamiliar codebase. For day-to-day work, completions are often enough.
4. Compare the alternatives
The code-assistant market is competitive. Before simply absorbing the new pricing, assess whether your usage justifies staying on Copilot, shifting part of the team to a competitor, or self-hosting an open model for sensitive tasks. The answer depends on your volume and your confidentiality constraints.
5. Build the cost into your quotes
If you are an agency or a service provider, usage-based billing must show up in your estimates. The cost of AI tools becomes a variable production expense, just like hosting. A digital audit of your tool chain helps you price this new reality.
A Simple Way to Estimate Your Monthly Cost
You do not need a finance degree to forecast your Copilot bill. Start from the credit allowance your plan already includes, then estimate how much agentic work your team does on top of autocomplete.
Take a five-developer team on Copilot Business. The plan is $19 per user per month and includes $19 of AI Credits each — so $95 of monthly credits are baked in before any extra spend. Since one credit equals $0.01, that allowance covers 9,500 credits of token usage across the team. For developers who lean mostly on autocomplete, which stays free, and reach for the chat or an agent a few times a day, that allowance is often enough.
The cost only grows when usage gets heavy: running agents across large repositories, calling the most expensive models repeatedly, or automating long multi-step tasks. A practical method is to track one representative week, read the per-user consumption reports GitHub provides, and multiply by four. That gives you a realistic monthly projection you can convert into dirhams and present to finance.
Two habits keep the number under control. First, default to the lighter models for routine questions and reserve the heavyweight models for genuinely hard problems. Second, review consumption monthly rather than waiting for the invoice — the teams that get surprised are the ones that never look. Treat the credit meter like any other metered utility: visible, owned, and reviewed on a schedule. That discipline is what separates teams that absorb the change calmly from those that panic at the first bill.
The Trap of Multiplying AI Subscriptions
The Copilot change is part of a broader trend: most vendors are shifting to usage-based models, and AI subscriptions are piling up inside companies. We covered this phenomenon and how to control it in our guide on AI subscriptions as a budget time bomb. The reflex to adopt is the same: centralize tracking, assign a budget owner, and reassess every quarter.
For teams building custom products, this new paradigm also changes how you design internal tooling. Embedding AI into your own workflows through custom development lets you keep control of costs rather than absorbing whatever vendor pricing changes come next.
Anticipate Rather Than Absorb
Part of the developer community reacted sharply — some openly warn of a "meter shock." But the move to usage is not an inevitable cost spike if you get organized. Teams that measure, cap, and educate their developers will likely pay about as much as before, possibly less, by eliminating wasteful usage. Those that do nothing will find out about the bill too late.
The real issue is not Copilot specifically, but the new skill every technical team must build in 2026: managing AI costs the way you manage cloud infrastructure costs. It is a discipline, not a constraint.
FAQ
Will my Copilot subscription automatically cost more?
Not necessarily. Base plan prices are unchanged, and autocomplete stays free. Your bill only rises if your use of agentic features and advanced models exceeds the included credit allowance. For many moderate-usage teams, the cost will stay close to what it was.
What exactly are AI Credits?
They are Copilot's usage-based billing unit since June 1, 2026. One credit is worth $0.01, so $10 equals 1,000 credits. Consumption is metered by token (input, output, and cached) at each model's rate. They replace the old premium-request system.
Which features stay free?
Code completions and Next Edit suggestions — the classic autocomplete as you type — remain included in every plan without consuming credits. Agents, advanced chat, and automated tasks are what consume credits.
How do I avoid a billing surprise?
Measure your current consumption, set a monthly spending cap, reserve advanced models for high-value tasks, and assign someone to own budget tracking. Convert your budget into dirhams with a margin for exchange-rate movement.
Do I have to migrate right now?
If you are on a monthly Pro or Pro+ plan, the migration to usage-based billing happened automatically on June 1, 2026. If you are on an annual plan, you keep the old model until your subscription expires, which gives you time to prepare.