This January 2026 release brings significant improvements to GitHub Copilot in Visual Studio Code with agent-driven workflows, improvements to agent session management, and the introduction of agent support for Claude by Anthropic – right in your IDE.

Agent extensibility (models + integrations)

  • Claude agent support is in public preview and enables delegating tasks to Anthropic’s official Claude Agent SDK using Claude models from your GitHub Copilot subscription.
  • Richer chat interactions with MCP apps enable more tool-driven, interactive Copilot experiences inside VS Code.

Copilot Chat & UX

  • Faster, snappier chat experience with improved streaming responsiveness.
  • Higher-quality reasoning results for more reliable answers and better task execution.
  • Better visibility into model reasoning with thinking tokens and agents that ask questions instead of assuming.
  • Revamped editor inline chat to make in-context Copilot interactions feel more natural and effective while you code.

Multiagent development & session management

  • Improved agent session management makes it easier to delegate work across:
    • Copilot
    • Claude
    • Local agents
    • Background agents
    • Cloud agents
  • Seamless handoff and intervention: jump into agent work when needed, without disrupting momentum.
  • Agent status indicator shows sessions needing attention, subagents run in parallel for faster completion.

Copilot agent customization

  • Agent orchestrations enable building repeatable workflows tailored to your team or project.
  • Agent Skills plus org-wide customization help ensure more consistent outcomes across developers and environments.

Agent optimizations (smarter + faster)

  • Copilot Memory helps agents work smarter by retaining relevant context across interactions.
  • Faster code search via external indexing improves retrieval speed and responsiveness during large-repo development.

Agent security & trust

  • Terminal command sandboxing increases confidence when agents propose or execute commands (experimental, macOS/Linux only) .
  • Effective auto-approval rules improve safety and control for agent-driven actions while reducing unnecessary prompts.
  • Terminal lifecycle improvements give better control over background commands with timeout, await, and kill capabilities.
  • Integrated browser: Test and run apps without leaving the editor.
  • Terminal enhancements: Quality-of-life improvements for smoother, more reliable terminal usage.
  • Coding & editor improvements: Multiple refinements to everyday coding flow.
  • Extensions & API updates: New capabilities for extension authors to build richer experiences.

Happy coding!

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