GitHub Copilot
AI coding assistant from GitHub for code completion, chat, agents and pull request reviews.
HN commenters like it for its tight VS Code integration,1234 built-in pull request reviews567 and the choice of many models under one subscription.8910 The most common complaint is that the switch to usage-based billing made it much more expensive,11121314 and some find its automated reviews noisy and its output mediocre.151617
Why people recommend it
IDE integration · 3
Commenters praise how well it works inside VS Code, and some also use it in IntelliJ.
“I've been a huge fan of copilot in vscode, the tight integration beats the TUI harnesses”
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“it has become ClaudeCode-esque of late: sub-agents, skills, tool-calling, hooks…and continues to improve”
Model choice · 3
Users like switching between models or pairing one model to write and another to review.
“I use gh copilot and have opus interrogate me and write the plan, then gpt review the plan”
“One thing I miss after ditching Copilot (it got too expensive) was how I could trivially ask for features to be written by one model and verified by another.”
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“These days auto has always been good enough and so I"m glad I don't have to be the expert.”
PR reviews · 3
Its pull request reviews look at the whole repo and catch valid issues people missed.
“GitHub’s built in Copilot review for example will checkout the whole repo and do a broad review. I found it to be WAY better”
“It raises a lot of issues which are valid and which I never had found.”
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“having Copilot read through the PR is complementary and helps to catch some things that slipped through”
Cheap plans · 3
The $10 plan was seen as a good deal for light or personal use.
“I’ve been quite content with CoPilot’s $10/mo plan.”
“That was a great deal for my limited personal programming.”
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“Copilot was fantastic, it's usage was insane because it was by request not tokens for the longest time.”
GitHub workflow · 3
The Copilot app works across GitHub repos and handles PRs inside the app.
“I find the copilot app better integrated for the PR workflow with PR management available in the app.”
“it's been super helpful to just tell it to reference other repos for patterns or integrations”
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“a good tool helps a lot once I switched to Github Copilot app. It solved the friction and mental tax for me.”
Agent features · 2
It has added sub-agents, skills, hooks and mid-run steering.
“it has become ClaudeCode-esque of late: sub-agents, skills, tool-calling, hooks…and continues to improve”
“GitHub Copilot has a "steer with message" feature where I can course correct mid execution. I use it often.”
Caveats and dissent
Pricing change · 3
The move from per-request to per-token billing used up quotas fast and pushed people to cancel.
“GitHub Copilot had competitive pricing until yesterday when they changed from per-request to one of the most expensive per-token quotas.”
“Then it transitioned to abysmal over night when they switched to usage based billing.”
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“after pricing change I have already used 26% this month with very light usage.”
Noisy reviews · 3
Automated reviews produced many low-value comments and wasted tokens.
“Github copilot review is s great example of the worst possible way this can be misused.”
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“Not only did copilot eat up all my bloody llm credits”
Output quality · 3
Some found the harness gave mediocre results, ignored instructions or got lost while editing.
“I highly recommend not using the Copilot harness. Even with the same model I found it produced mediocre results”
“Github Copilot is the worst. It usually gets lost while editing some file. And it is incredibly slow.”
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“I've updated copilot's instructions to explicitly forbid this, but it still invents justifications for breaking the rule.”
Training on data · 3
Users were opted in to having interaction data used for training unless they opted out.
“Microsoft already did a rug pull on me and opted me in to training months after I signed up with Github Copilot.”
“pieces of your private code can end up in training data if you're using Copilot with it and don't opt out”
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“microsoft was training copilot on private repos”
Confusing billing · 3
Billing settings and premium requests are hard to understand, and some paid for seats nobody used.
“you will waste hours navigating their billing settings using various out-of-date documentation”
“I have no idea what a premium request is and it's all just too complicated to use.”
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“used the opportunity to cancel CoPilot altogether”
Speed · 2
Some commenters call it slow.
“Github Copilot is the worst. It usually gets lost while editing some file. And it is incredibly slow.”
“copilot is too slow for them too.”
Often compared with
3 moved from Claude Code to GitHub Copilot
8 moved from GitHub Copilot to Claude Code
3 moved from GitHub Copilot to Codex
1 moved from Cursor to GitHub Copilot
1 moved from GitHub Copilot to Cursor
4 moved from GitHub Copilot to OpenCode
1 moved from GitHub Copilot to Claude
1 moved from GitHub Copilot to Claude OpusCopilot11 comments mention both
Who recommends it in their own words
From the makers not counted in the ranking
“I tried plan mode when we first added it to github copilot and it didn’t stick for me, until very recently”
“I knew that day that StackOverflow was dead and my mind was blown.”
“We’ve been training on our internal usage for just over a year and have seen some major improvements.”
“we have been using the Github Copilot very regularly. It gives us unlimited Opus credits.”
Threads where it came up
- GitHub Copilot is moving to usage-based billing 6 mentions
- Ask HN: Senior software engineers, how do you use Claude Code? 6 mentions
- Ask HN: What is your (AI) dev tech stack / workflow? (June 2026) 4 mentions
- Ask HN: How is AI-assisted coding going for you professionally? 4 mentions
- Kimi K2.7 Code is generally available in GitHub Copilot 3 mentions
- Ask HN: What tools are you using for AI-assisted code review? 3 mentions
Data: github-copilot.json. Quotes are verbatim; the verdict and theme labels are written by a model from these comments, and every clause links to its sources.
All comments 48
“(and Copilot at work)”
“Most comments were garbage”
“Not only did copilot eat up all my bloody llm credits”
“Github copilot review is s great example of the worst possible way this can be misused.”
“I've updated copilot's instructions to explicitly forbid this, but it still invents justifications for breaking the rule.”
“When I use GitHub Copilot (for work) with Anthropic models I can easily rack up quite a significant bill.”
“copilot is too slow for them too.”
“Personally at home I use the free github copilot and then openrouter when that runs out.”
“I highly recommend not using the Copilot harness. Even with the same model I found it produced mediocre results”
“My company has largely switched to Luna after Microsoft raised prices for Copilot.”
“At Sony we use Copilot (as an MS enterprise customer)”
“it's been super helpful to just tell it to reference other repos for patterns or integrations”
“if you already lean on tools like Copilot/LLMs, you’ll be at home.”
“These days auto has always been good enough and so I"m glad I don't have to be the expert.”
“I use Vscode copilot chat”
“I like copilot better than Claude for the most part.”
“Claude Code, GitHub Copilot”
“when GitHub Copilot gave you 300 requests for like 10$”
“Then it transitioned to abysmal over night when they switched to usage based billing.”
“Copilot was fantastic, it's usage was insane because it was by request not tokens for the longest time.”
“I have not seen much gain personally at that period except in the last 12 months.”
“it suggested that I use both side by side (copilot for inside the IDE and Claude for 'extra' prompts)”
“My employer has us using Copilot a lot, and it works well enough”
“I use copilot as my daily driver”
“Symlink the global MD files to a single file I control that is versioned.”
“GitHub’s built in Copilot review for example will checkout the whole repo and do a broad review. I found it to be WAY better”
“For work, Github Copilot with either GPT 5 mini or toss up between Opus/Sol”
“The first programming AI I tried was github's copilot, and I was already astonished.”
“I'm back to VsCode plus Copilot Pro.”
“It's a great product compared to Copilot.”
“AI code agent regressions Copilot and Claude silently slipped in behind remote FFs with shifting cohorts”
“I started using OpenCode + GitHub Copilot”
“I use it all the time and don't know what more I could wish for.”
“Microsoft already did a rug pull on me and opted me in to training months after I signed up with Github Copilot.”
“I use GHCP but similar sentiment.”
“I use CoPilot and I barely touch 40% token spend per month and to me it’s the best way to work”
“I used to use it very heavily during the original copilot days back in 2021 but it has been made totally obsolete by long running agents.”
“annoyed by VS Code injecting copilot and other "helpers"”
“We still have Github Copilot reviewing because it will (very occasionally) catch something BugBot missed, but the false positive rate is wayyyy higher”
“it just created a massive pile of slop that kept growing and getting worse”
“One thing I miss after ditching Copilot (it got too expensive) was how I could trivially ask for features to be written by one model and verified by another.”
“I use gh copilot and have opus interrogate me and write the plan, then gpt review the plan”
“It raises a lot of issues which are valid and which I never had found.”
“GitHub Copilot had competitive pricing until yesterday when they changed from per-request to one of the most expensive per-token quotas.”
“after pricing change I have already used 26% this month with very light usage.”
“Personally, I think it sucks: the tooling is inconsistent across VSCode and Visual Studio”
“Copilot reviews are good”
“I've been a huge fan of copilot in vscode, the tight integration beats the TUI harnesses”