New Surface Devices Drop Copilot PC Branding

Microsoft’s new Surface Pro 12 and Surface Laptop 13 meet the hardware requirements previously associated with Copilot PCs but are not being marketed under that label, Surface executive Brett Ostrum said. The change removes the branding from the recently announced devices, while Microsoft and Qualcomm say their AI capabilities remain. Ostrum said the two Surface models satisfy the company’s former requirements for Copilot devices and that Microsoft continues to promote AI features, including on-device and hybrid capabilities. He did not explain why the label was omitted. The statements establish a change in how these products are presented, but do not amount to a formal announcement that Microsoft has retired Copilot PC branding across its product lineup. Qualcomm senior vice president Kedar Kondap said the devices would offer the same experiences, probably without using Copilot PC terminology. He described the original category as a way to identify computers built to deliver particular neural processing unit, or NPU, experiences and meet a performance threshold.