Microsoft 365 boosts prices in 2026 … to pay for more AI and security

Microsoft 365 customers have gotten an early Christmas present from Santa Satya: price rises. All that AI goodness isn't going to pay for itself. The increases, which will affect the company's commercial, frontline worker, and government customers, take effect from July 1, 2026, and range from a slight bump to an eye-watering …

[Hubert Cumberdale]

"In the last year, we released more than 1,100 features across Microsoft 365, Security, Copilot, and SharePoint."

And I'm completely willing to pay extra for all of the features in that list that I actually want. Guess how many that is.

[wolfetone]

Well before you list then, can you start with the ones that actually work?

[Jimjam3]

I don’t think you can list with no items.

[Hubert Cumberdale]

List<string> thingsThatActuallyWork = new List<string>();

[Strahd Ivarius]

Is a CVE a feature now?

[Simon Reed]

It always was.

[daflibble]

so you need a 86% discount?

[Richard Jones 1]

I just wish 365 would STOP losing documents and denying they ever existed!

[Nick Ryan]

Yeah... we had that happen. User was working on a document, saved it, renamed the document (all on SP Online) and came back later to find the document had disappeared entirely, even gone from application MRU (Most Recently Used) lists. "Comments added to document" recorded in the piss-take "activity" list for the document. Version history of the document shows nothing other than the prior document. Naturally, the "audit" functions have been moved so nothing that even pretends to be documentation by Microsoft is accurate and the apparent no location for audit trails to find out what happened lists absolutely nothing for the entire document library despite all the auditing being enabled (apparently).

[Anonymous Coward]

Do not want

my employer has just shoved co-pilot down our throats and boasted and mentioned about usage and then potential licence removal (so there is hope)

I asked for it to go now as I am not going to use it and was told it is automated and if not used in 6 weeks I will lose my licence (yay)

Have said I do not want to use it, not going to use it, but I do not want it to say it is being used when it gets in the bloody way and said "want to use co pilot", "would you like copilot to summarise" and so on

[blu3b3rry]

Re: Do not want

I'm curious what take-up has been like for Copilot at my employer. A month or two back our 365 accounts were tweaked to enable access to it - and apparently we're also allowed to upload company documentation....! According to IT it's "secure", or so they're told by Microsoft.

I'm going to be very unhappy if I find someone feeds any of my personal information into that imbecilic data-harvesting excuse for a chatbot.

[Simon Reed]

Re: Do not want

You may as well get unhappy now. How long do you think it took for some manager in HR to upload all the staff data to work out bonuses / redundancies / whatevs.

[Brave Coward]

Micro$oft getting old

From 'Start me up!' to 'I can get no (satisfaction)'.

[David 132]

Re: Micro$oft getting old

"You make a grown man cry..."

[Steve Davies 3]

Re: Micro$oft getting old

I'd prefer 'Paint it Black Screen Of Death' and then FSCK the boot sector.

[Anonymous Coward]

nice one SatNad

Just when companies are firing workers by the thousand, MS decides to increase its prices.

How many companies will tell SatNad to get lost because they can't afford the expense.

Proudly MS free since Sept 2016 other than a W11 VM that I need because the UK Tax fleecers decide that certain forms relating to Charities can only be filled in from a W11 system.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: nice one SatNad

"How many companies will tell SatNad to get lost because they can't afford the expense."

Not very many, because the up-front cost of moving to something else would be more than several years of the extra Microsoft costs, and they won't have the money in the CapEx budget for a major platform move.

Microsoft knows this, of course, and will no doubt carefully consider how much they can increase prices by and not lose much business.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: nice one SatNad

"Proudly MS free since Sept 2016 other than a W11 VM that I need because the UK Tax fleecers decide that certain forms relating to Charities can only be filled in from a W11 system."

Interestingly, my last contact with HMRC for charity work was reclaiming GiftAid and it needed LibreOffice Calc (run on my Mac's Ubuntu VM) - the HMRC instructions were explicit in saying their spreadsheet should not be used with Excel.

I, too, limit Windows to a VM for (very) occasional use - nowadays, most times it's fired up it's to keep it updated. However, 365 is still my main "office" suite (with CoPilot disabled). I switched to Word when WordPerfect for Windows came out (when Windows was still my main OS) and it was a nightmare and Excel was more useful than Quattro Pro (PowerPoint just came with it and was there when I started to need presentations - I only had occasional need for Harvard Graphics back then).

[Rich 2]

Different planet

Microsoft said, "Organizations face an increasingly complex threat landscape, rising IT demands, and the urgent need for AI-powered transformation.“

An URGENT NEED FOR AI-POWERED TRANSFORMATION???

What the actual fuck!?

[Ken Hagan]

Re: Different planet

The increasingly complex threat landscape seems to be mainly caused by mis-placed faith in the ability of AI to solve problems that current techniques are not suited to.

It'll be an AI-powered transformation alright, just not the kind they are hoping for.

[munnoch]

Re: Different planet

I have a very urgent need for everything related to AI to stay the fuck out of my life.

[Strahd Ivarius]

Re: Different planet

The next step in AI transformation:

You: How can I remove Copilot from my system

Copilot: You can't without moving to Linux

You: Can you do it for me

Copilot: Sure, let me start downloading it

[Excused Boots]

Re: Different planet

"Copilot: Sure, let me start downloading it"

I'm sorry Dave but I can't do that!

[Simon Reed]

Re: Different planet

Ironically, my work Windows laptop keeps trying to download and install "Windows Subsystem for Linux". It fails every time.

Meanwhile at home my wife and I have only used Linux since about 2000 and not paid any Windows tax since then.

I cannot work out why Windows provides a Linux subsystem. Is it to mitigate all the problems Windows has? Which I have mitigated for myself by not using Windows.

Why are corporates so afraid of moving away from Microsoft and using Linux instead?

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Different planet

"Why are corporates so afraid of moving away from Microsoft and using Linux instead?"

Because much corporate software only works properly with Microsoft. Many will also be using Microsoft cloudy services (Exchange, Sharepoint, etc) and Microsoft authentication (Entra ID). Many of the support providers will only support Microsoft (and possibly Apple / Android). Implementing an MDM solution for Linux would be significantly more complicated and expensive. A large number of the users would need training. Etc.

It's really not difficult to see how Microsoft maintains its monopoly. What is more difficult to see is why the Linux fans seem unable to understand it. Using Linux on a couple of home computers is in no way comparable to trying to implement it on a corporate system with thousands of users and devices.

[Excused Boots]

Re: Different planet

And this is quite true, it’s refreshing to see a post which understands the reality of how the corporate world works, and why the knee-jerk ‘move to Linux’ response to every problem does't really work.

If you are a home user, then yes, absolutely yes, dump Microsoft faster than a fast thing and move to Linux.

If you run a small business, a dozen or so users, then absolutely you should at least investigate the option of moving, it won’t be seamless, you will get push back from some of your staff, there will probably be a degree of retraining and not everything will work exactly the same. But get over the initial hump and you will be saving money and not dealing with random MS weirdness.

But, you run an Enterprise, tens, hundreds of thousands of seats, your entire business is now built around Sharepoint/ OneDrive, Dynamics databases, Intune (or whatever it is called today), access to resources is all controlled by Entra - suddenly it’s not so easy to ‘just move away’. Certainly it’s worth investigating but large corporates tend to work on a short-term basis. Short term it will cost $LOTS_OF_MONEY to shift. Long term, it will pay off in spades, but companies.......

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: . Long term, it will pay off in spades

for MS. They have your money AND your data to slurp at their hearts content. With AI going through it with a fine tooth comb. your company will not be able to hide their secrets from MS (and by implication, Uncle Sam) for long.

All your data is theirs.

[DJV]

Re: Organizations face an increasingly complex threat landscape

Most of the threats are from Microsoft's borked updates!

[ecofeco]

Re: Organizations face an increasingly complex threat landscape

Yes indeed.

[Nick Ryan]

Re: Different planet

"URGENT NEED FOR AI-POWERED TRANSFORMATION" this was a mis-spoke by the marketing droid. What they meant was "shareholders could get scared about the amount of cash being poured down the open sewer of AI and demand that their dividen payouts are maintained".

[Ishura]

Re: Different planet

It's urgent for Microsoft that their captives, er, customers, start using AI so that Microsoft can justify all their investment into it.

[ecofeco]

Re: Different planet

Threat landscape... created by M$.

[Potemkine!]

Re: Different planet

It's the new mantra of CEO/CIO. They think they can earn a lot of money with that (meaning they will be able to fire more people)

[Groo The Wanderer - A Canuck]

Libre Office for the win. Total cost: $0. Total value: whatever suckers are paying Microsquishy for having all their data hoovered to feed their Artificial Ignorance fantasies.

When the AI bubble bursts, there may well be a severe reconning among the primary operating systems that are still trusted after such an obsessive venture into unproven territory...

[Simon Reed]

One of the things I have enjoyed about Linux, ThunderBird and LibreOffice is the way Microsoft eventually take their innovations and build them into Windows and their products.

[rmullen0]

Wrong again Bob

Prices went down. Down to 0. I'm on Debian now and using LibreOffice. Have fun destroying humanity with AI chumps. I won't be a part of it.

[Anonymous Coward]

OK, slowly de-skill your employees via AI laziness

Later, gasp at the increased price of AI subs!

Hmmm, ditch AI

Ask employees to convert back to manual skills. What? They’ve become less able? How did that happen?

[steviebuk]

It makes me smile

For several years I've been saying full cloud is a bad idea and will be MORE expensive. For months I was getting told "No, you're wrong. It will be cheaper as you'll be getting rid of your old kit". As always, I was ignored and they were listened to until recently. Someone kicked off "Why is our bill increasing? You said it would be cheaper to go full cloud". They've finally admitted "Of course its not going to be cheaper". Its in THEIR best interest that we are fully cloud, not ours.

I smirked but said nothing.

Fuck whits.

[Scotthva5]

Re: It makes me smile

My employer - a small project management firm - is slowly switching back to on-prem after repeated AWS outages and rising prices. A Linux native version of our management application suite should be ready by third quarter 2026 thanks to Microsoft's addiction to 'AI' and the cost of keeping our Win 10 rigs running.

[M.V. Lipvig]

Re: It makes me smile

No, you don't smirk. You hand around emails showing that you told them it would happen, with them saying it would not.

THEN you smirk.

[Bebu sa Ware]

Re: It makes me smile

"full cloud is a bad idea"

Never go full retard cloud.

Fuck whits. See above.

[sarusa]

Just go back to Office 2021

A year ago, when Office 365 was obviously going to complete shit, I bought an Office 2021 key off StackSocial for $40. I installed it, it works fantastic, it has NONE of the AI shit, it doesn't cost me $80 / mo, just $40 once. Forever. What a concept. If you want to go back further, I think they have Office 2016 for $10!

I've been told these are probably enterprise keys that are not supposed to resold, but at this point I don't give a single f@#$. F@%# Microsoft and f@$#% Nadella sideways up the ass with a chainsaw. I was using your products and paying you and then you just turned them to complete f@Q#ing shit and I only have to do this because you completely destroyed what I was paying for. This is self defense.

So as someone who sadly NEEDS Office (Libre Office compat with Excel is not good enough to trade complex spreadsheets), this is the best solution I've found. And MS can't make it worse every f@#$ing month!

[David Hicklin]

Re: Just go back to Office 2021

Sod all that nagging to sign into Microsoft , well at least that is what my 2016 version did.

I use office 2010 and there I will stay

[razorfishsl]

over 1,100 new features

is 1,100 parts of an AI grft plus one bug they fixed from 2016 than now provides a fully working function in excel.

[sarusa]

Just go back to Office 2021

So more politely than my previous effort, after Office 365 was obviously going to heck I bought a license for Office 2021 from St*ck S*cial for $40. One time payment, it works great, no AI, no subscription, what a concept. I need Office (TM) because LibreOffice is unfortunately not compatible enough for complex Excel spreadsheets, so I went with this. If you want to go back even further I think they have Office 2016 for $10!

I've been told these are probably business keys that are not supposed to be resold, but I don't care because the only reason I needed to do this is that I was paying you money and you completely broke the product. I bought an auto from you, then you came along and tore all the tyres off and smashed all the windows with a hammer. If anything, MS owes me that $40 I paid to fix their product, but of course that's not going to happen. But I think this is entirely justified.

[Excused Boots]

Re: Just go back to Office 2021

Oh I think your previous effort was far more succinct and made your point quite eloquently.

“I don't give a single f@#$. F@%# Microsoft and f@$#% Nadella sideways up the ass with a chainsaw.”

I suspect you aren’t a fan then?

[sarusa]

Re: Just go back to Office 2021

Wow, El Reg did not show my previous comment for DAYS so I assumed they had just banned it not being asskissing enough to MS for HP Enterprise. Sorry for the double post! And the first one was absolutely better.

[David Hicklin]

Re: Just go back to Office 2021

Your post was obviously held back until the daily digest went out as I could see it

[FirstTangoInParis]

Helping non-profits?

nonprofit pricing will be adjusted in line with commercial pricing.

And in fact free licensing for charities is already a thing of the past. We’re off to Google.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Helping non-profits?

"And in fact free licensing for charities is already a thing of the past."

It's not. There are still some free licenses, and reductions on others. Charity pricing isn't as good as it was in the past, for sure, but it still exists.

[Jonathan Knight]

Re: Helping non-profits?

Both are true.

Microsoft offered 10 free Business Premium Licenses to non-profits so the little guys got Microsoft for free and the bigger ones got a big discount. Even the licences over the 10 were discounted.

That's no longer the case. Now there's 10 free Business Basic licenses which means no more free desktop apps, just the web based ones.

It's caused a bit of a re-think for the non-profits I volunteer at. We're just buying one desktop 2024 license for the person who needs to work "out and about" and can't be online all the time. Everyone else is moving away from Microsoft, it turns out we didn't really need it.

Jon

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Helping non-profits?

There are significant discounts on the higher tier licenses too for larger charities - e.g. M365 E3, etc.

[Hi Wreck]

Rental Software

Wasn't the whole point of using a subscription model was to get all the new cruft automagically? Now you have to pay more for cruft you don't even want. I guess that's an improvement in the subscription model itself.

[David Hicklin]

Re: Rental Software

no no no !

a subscription model is to tie you in and provide an ever increasing revenue stream. Nice documents you have there, shame if you stopped paying and something happened to them.....

[Anonymous Coward]

They've put the price up for family and personal plans. Whereas you could get it for £50 or so pounds a year, now it's around £84. Just to pay for the bollocks AI features.

They are offering a classic family plan for a lower monthly cost without the AI shite. It's still more expensive.

Think I may just transfer my considerable amount of OneDrive storage to Google and take up Libre Office or something.

[Will Godfrey]

AI - Security

These are two expressions that should never appear in the same sentence.

[the spectacularly refined chap]

Re: AI - Security

I read the security element as "We screwed up the first time round, exposed you to vulnerabilities for years, and now expect you to pay up for our mistakes."

[ecofeco]

Re: AI - Security

I read the security element as "We screwed up the first time round, exposed you to vulnerabilities for years, and now expect you to pay up for our mistakes."

Because that was exactly what they said. Just in corporate bulldada.

[O'Reg Inalsin]

Those prices, even after the increase, are far below the average running cost per customer, let alone being no more than a drop in the ocean towards covering planned data center build costs.

Profit no longer matters - all that matters is controlling the giant ball of investment, and for that a monolith of a 5/10/15-year plan works well. The sucking sounds you hear in the rest of the economy is the sound of success.

[David Hicklin]

> Those prices, even after the increase

This is just the start, think of the boiling frog analogy...

[Sometimes]

Since AI cannot really be sold...

...at least not based on demand and to make it profitable, we all obviously need to be forced to buy it to prove the point. How can subscribers say "but we don't want the AI"

[the Jim bloke]

bundling shit you dont want with shit you do use

Separate out the AI and put it behind a paywall...

And let it starve to death alone in the dark..

instead of forcing all the mug users to carry its dysfunctional carcass every where they go.

amongst the myriad articles regarding AI just here on el Reg, someone pointed out that if it actually did enhance productivity - people would actually use it. hasnt happened.

There are real applications for AI, but chatbots are only good for kids cheating on their homework, and consultancy companies cheating on their government contracts..

[ComicalEngineer]

I went Libre Office / Thunderbird / Firefox about 20 years ago. I think the final straw for me personally was the abortion that is the ribbon in Office 2007, plus the £99 per version of outlook, and as our family had 8 PCs at the time, there was no was that I was going to pay £800 for an email client.

These days I don't have any complex spreadsheeting needs so Libre Calc is fine, and I find Writer better than Word, so that's a winner.

I retain a copy of Office 2010 merely for my few customers who are wedded to M$ Office, but as most of my work is issued as PDFs that becoming a very infrequent event.

[Snowy]

Yet nothing

To pay to fix the bugs.

[Blackjack]

Offline Microsoft Office can still be bought, right? Excel is what companies really want after all.

[Anonymous Coward]

The retail versions require registering them with a Microsoft account. The volume license ones (LTSC) don't so far as I'm aware (that said, I've not tried the 2024 version - last I used was 2021). However, they do constantly nag the user to sign in with a Microsoft account.

[anthonyhegedus]

Isn't that why we pay monthly for this?

I thought the whole point of paying monthly rather than one-off was to pay for updates, bug fixes, feature improvements etc on a continuous basis. Now they're saying that we have to pay extra for that (compulsory of course).

Is this all part of the "new commerce experience" (aka price rises) that we had a few years ago?

[Always Right Mostly]

I'd pay more to lose O365 and all their AI and cloud bullshit and restore the ability of a small business to actually interact with Microsoft via humans over the phone.

Getting old but, fuck Nadella.

[TVU]

"Microsoft 365 boosts prices in 2026 … to pay for more AI and security"

But the problem there is that they are extracting even more cash to fund unwanted bloatware.

[Anonymous Coward]

moving away

I would hazard a guess, that the combination of:

US politics (especially the boycott US movement)

US tariffs

US political interference

Microsoft's interference in the ICC

The never ending privacy violations

The never ending push of AI

The ever increasing cost of Cloud

The total fuckup that is Windows 11

The move of Office into the cloud

M$ abandoning their own games console

etc...

means that more people are currently seeking Microsoft alternatives than at any pointing in history. That, alone, is a very positive thing.

[Camilla Smythe]

They could save a bit of cash if they kicked the script kiddies off their cloud who are filling up my logs with failed requests to the WordPress instance that is not running on my little Web Server.[1]

Top tip for Microsoft Pseudo Security Wonks.

You are routing the traffic from your cloud to my IP. You can legally sniff that traffic and spot the regular shitstorm of 252 requests from one IP address to another and narrow down the culprit before killing them.

Literally would be nice.

It would also be nice if you responded to reports via your reporting channels of such behaviour rather than sticking your fingers in your ears shouting "We can't hear you. Bow down before our massive data pipes."

[1] Oh Wait. The Script kiddies are paying Microsoft to fill up everyone else's server logs with dross. Silly me.

[897241021271418289475167044396734464892349863592355648549963125148587659264921474689457046465304467]

Is "AI" of any use?

[the Jim bloke]

writing country music, apparently we dont have enough already.

[Pantagoon]

I renewed my Microsoft 365 Family today and despite being on the 'Classic' non-AI subscription, I still had to cancel and choose 'Classic' again otherwise it would have renewed at the inflated price.