Microsoft Copilot can improve your writing in Word, Outlook and OneNote – here’s how

Contents

How to use the context menu in OneNote Summarize documents, notes, emails or long threads How to use the Copilot sidebar in Word and OneNote How to use the context menu in OneNote How to Summarize Emails and Conversations in Outlook Get a summary when sharing a Word document (for business plans only)

In the text input box, you can refine the result by typing further input.

While the Copilot sidebar offers more options for refining rewritten text than for text generated from scratch, it is still less powerful than the Rewrite with Copilot panel. The best way to rewrite text with Copilot in Word is to use the Rewrite with Copilot panel.

How to use the context menu in OneNote

Alternatively, in OneNote, you can right-click the top bar of a text field on a page. In the menu that opens, select Co-pilot and in the next menu, Write again.

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This action will cause Copilot to rewrite everything inside this text field. The rewrite will be placed at the top of the text field.

Howard Wen / IDG

Summarize documents, notes, emails or long threads

You can have Copilot generate a short summary of a long document in Word or a page in OneNote. For this to work well, Microsoft says the document or page must contain at least 300 words, but no more than 20,000.

In Outlook, Copilot can summarize a long email and, even more usefully, the conversation within an entire email thread.

How to use the Copilot sidebar in Word and OneNote

With the document open in Word or the page open in OneNote, highlight the text you want to summarize. (If you want a summary of the entire document or page, skip this step.)

Click on the Co-pilot on the Home tab of the ribbon toolbar to open the Copilot sidebar. Inside the text input box, type resume and click the arrow button.

Copilot will generate a summary and display it within the sidebar.

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Below the summary, you will find the familiar Copy Button to copy the summary to your PC’s clipboard.

Below that, you can click References to see a list of citations within the document that Copilot used to generate this summary. Clicking on a piece of quoted text will show you in the main application window where in the document or page these words are found. Clicking on the down arrow to the right of a citation will show you the passage that Copilot used as a citation.

Word Copilot sidebar with references for the summary — Click *References* to see the citations for the document that Copilot used for its summary.

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Between the results field and the text entry box, you’ll see suggestions that you can click to review the summary. Click the circular arrow icon to update these suggestions with new ones.

How to use the context menu in OneNote

Right-click the top bar of a text field. In the menu that opens, select Copilot > SummarizeThis action will cause Copilot to summarize everything within this text field. The summary will be placed at the top of the text field.

OneNote Copilot Overview — Copilot summaries created through the OneNote context menu appear at the top of the text field being summarized.

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How to Summarize Emails and Conversations in Outlook

Open the email or conversation you want to summarize. Click Resume either Copilot Summary at the top of the email thread. Copilot will generate a summary of the email or thread.

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This summary will be posted at the top of the email or discussion thread. Discussion thread summaries may include quotes that Copilot used to generate the summary. Clicking on a quote (indicated by a number) will scroll down the thread to the quoted email so you can view it.

Howard Wen / IDG

If you have Copilot with a Microsoft 365 business plan, you can use Copilot to generate a summary of a Word document when you share it with your coworkers. This summary is inserted as a text passage within the message your coworkers receive inviting them to collaborate on the document.

With the document open in Word, click the button Share button to the top right corner. In the Share panel that opens, click the Co-pilot icon in the bottom right corner of the “Add a message” compose box. The AI will generate and insert the summary. You can edit the summary before sending the invitation.

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