GitHub Copilot Documentation

What the docs cover

GitHub's Copilot documentation is organised around the places Copilot works and the concepts behind them:

• Plans and access: Copilot Free, the Copilot Student plan for verified students, paid plans, and free Copilot Pro for verified teachers and maintainers of popular open source projects.
• In your editor: inline suggestions, chat, slash commands and agents in VS Code, Visual Studio, JetBrains IDEs and others, with a tab for each editor on many pages.
• Customising: repository custom instructions in .github/copilot-instructions.md, path-specific .instructions.md files, and organisation instructions.
• Copilot CLI: installing it, trusted directories, and the --allow-tool and --deny-tool options that control what it may run.
• On GitHub: Copilot code review on pull requests and the Copilot cloud agent, which researches a repository, works on a branch in a GitHub Actions environment and opens a pull request.
• Responsible use and security: content exclusion, code referencing for suggestions that match public code, and the limits of each feature.

Is it worth your time?

Yes, mostly as a reference you check before you rely on something. Copilot runs in many places and features differ by plan and editor, so the most useful habit is checking the relevant page before building a workflow around a feature. The plans page and the content exclusion page are two to read early: one tells you what you actually have, the other explains what Copilot can and cannot be stopped from seeing. For example, GitHub notes that agent mode in IDE chat does not support content exclusion.

How it relates to the VS Code docs

Much of the day-to-day editor experience is documented by Microsoft on code.visualstudio.com, including keyboard shortcuts, the Plan agent, permission levels and prompt files. The GitHub docs cover the account, plans, GitHub.com features and the CLI. You will use both.

How it fits the Coding with AI tools roadmap

The Sefism roadmap for Copilot points to these docs when you check your plan, write custom instructions, set CLI tool rules, request code review and try the cloud agent. The roadmap gives the order and the habits; the docs give the current details.

Common questions

Is it free? The docs are free. Copilot Free has monthly limits, and students can apply for Copilot Student through GitHub Education.

Do features change often? Yes. Names change too: the coding agent is now called the Copilot cloud agent. Trust the current docs over older blog posts.