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Microsoft Copilot is now a workday assistant and nighttime confidant, report finds

Across 37.5 million conversations, users turned to Copilot not just for tasks, but for advice, reflection, and everyday decisions.

Copilot usage patterns from Microsoft’s 2025 report show health dominating mobile chats at all hours, while work-related queries peak on desktops. (Image: Microsoft)

AI has become a daily staple for millions of users worldwide. Microsoft just dropped one of the world’s largest studies of AI conversations, showing how the technology has permeated millions of lives. The Copilot Usage Report 2025 looks at 37.5 million anonymized conversations people had with Microsoft Copilot between January and September 2025.

The report focuses on when and how the AI is being used, and the key finding is that AI use is shaped by context, especially the device a person is using it on and the time of day. Mustafa Suleyman, the CEO of Microsoft AI, took to his LinkedIn profile to share the findings. He revealed that the researchers found three different trends by day, time of day, and time of the year. He quipped that one of the three remains ‘rock solid constant.’

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While the report found that across all devices, technology and work-related topics dominated when ranked as top topics people were asking Copilot about, for mobile users, health was topmost irrespective of the day, month, or time. “This is a huge responsibility for us, and one we’re super focused on,” Suleyman wrote. According to the report, users are not only checking symptoms, they are also seeking advice.

The report also found some big differences between weekday and weekend trending topics. It stated that gaming saw a two-day spike on Saturdays and Sundays, while most coding-related conversations took place between Mondays and Fridays.

Meanwhile, on the desktop, people use Copilot as a professional tool. Between 8 am and 5 pm, work and technology dominate conversations. Even though enterprise (office) accounts were excluded from this dataset, personal devices still show strong work usage. This indicates how the lines between personal and work tech have blurred over time.

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When it comes to time of day, data showed that philosophical conversations spiked in the early hours of the morning. Late at night, topics like religion, spirituality, personal wellness, and big life questions rise across both devices. It seems Copilot doubles as a midnight therapist for everything from existential dread to long-term goals. Similarly, there was an uptick in travel-focused conversations happening mostly during commute hours.

On the other hand, when it came to time of the year, the report highlighted how seasonal differences impacted trending topics. It showed that in February, Valentine’s Day saw a hike in relationship-related conversations. Suleyman shared that 2-3 days before it, conversations on personal growth and wellness surged too. Similarly, early in the year, programming-heavy conversations were more common. By September, social and cultural topics became more prominent. This suggests that as AI became more mainstream, the user base expanded beyond early technical adopters.

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The report shows that AI is not uniform and changes depending on the device, time of day, and even time of year.