Microsoft issued a formal announcement on Tuesday confirming that its widely used Copilot artificial intelligence chatbot will be permanently removed from the WhatsApp platform starting January 15, 2026. The decision stems directly from Meta’s sweeping revision of the WhatsApp Business API policies, which now categorically prohibit external developers and providers from deploying generative AI tools, large language models, or general-purpose AI assistants where such technology constitutes the primary service offered to users.

This marks the second major casualty in less than a month, following OpenAI’s October disclosure that ChatGPT would also cease operations on WhatsApp after the same cut-off date. The updated policy explicitly forbids any direct or indirect use of the WhatsApp Business solution by AI-centric services, effectively closing what had been a popular unofficial channel for millions of users seeking instant AI assistance within their everyday messaging environment.

For current Copilot-on-WhatsApp users, the transition will be final and non-reversible: conversation histories stored within WhatsApp cannot be migrated to Microsoft’s authenticated platforms due to security and authentication constraints. Microsoft has urged users who wish to preserve their chat logs to manually export them using WhatsApp’s native export functionality before the January deadline, after which the service will become completely inaccessible within the app.

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Copilot itself remains fully operational and, according to Microsoft, significantly more capable on its dedicated surfaces. Users can continue accessing the AI assistant via the official website at copilot.microsoft.com, through standalone mobile applications on iOS and Android, and within the Microsoft 365 ecosystem, where advanced features such as image generation, deep research mode, and enterprise-grade data protection are available—capabilities that were never fully supported in the constrained WhatsApp integration.

The abrupt policy shift represents a dramatic pivot for Meta, which had previously encouraged third-party AI experimentation on WhatsApp Business as part of its broader push into conversational commerce. Industry observers interpret the crackdown as a strategic move to centralise control over AI interactions, potentially clearing the way for Meta’s own in-house AI offerings while addressing mounting regulatory pressure and privacy concerns surrounding unvetted generative tools operating at massive scale on one of the world’s largest messaging platforms.

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