Copilot scope for bot command list not used by M365 Copilot

[Benjiiim]

Cross-posting from OfficeDev/microsoft-teams-app-schema#187 as asked by the Microsoft Teams App Submissions team.

I have a Teams app that includes a bot defined by the below sample snippet in the Teams app manifest:

{
"bots": [
        {
            "botId": "${{CHAT_API_CLIENT_ID}}",
            "scopes": [
                "personal",
                "groupChat",
                "team",
                "copilot"
            ],
            "commandLists": [
                {
                    "scopes": [
                        "copilot"
                    ],
                    "commands": [
                        {
                            "title": "Test1 title",
                            "description": "Test 1 description"
                        }
                    ]
                },
                {
                    "scopes": [
                        "personal"
                    ],
                    "commands": [
                        {
                            "title": "Test2 title",
                            "description": "Test 2 description"
                        }
                    ]
                }
            ],
            "isNotificationOnly": false,
            "supportsCalling": false,
            "supportsVideo": false,
            "supportsFiles": false
        }
    ]
}

Despite specifying a separate command list for Copilot with the copilot scope, Copilot seems to be using the personal scoped command list. Is it to be expected that the copilot scope is not used in M365 Copilot, and M365 Copilot should be using the personal scope?

Teams bot chat:

Copilot chat:

[m365-agent-toolkit-assistant]

👋 Hi @Benjiiim,

Thank you for reporting this issue! We want to let you know that:

⏱️ Our team will personally review your issue
🎯 You can expect a response within 1 business day

✨ This is an AI-generated initial response
🤖 AI-Generated Preliminary Analysis:

Yes, it is currently expected that M365 Copilot does not use the copilot scoped command list, and instead relies on the personal scope for bot commands.

Background & Reason:

• The manifest schema added the copilot scope for future-proofing, but M365 Copilot (as of Toolkit v5.x and manifest schema 1.16) still defaults to reading commands from the personal scope.
• Microsoft is aware of this and has acknowledged that tooling and runtime do not yet consume copilot-scoped command lists. Documentation updates and product support are being tracked (reference).

What you should do:

• Define your Copilot bot commands under the personal scope for now.
• You can keep copilot scope in your manifest for future compatibility, but it will not be used until Microsoft updates the Teams/Copilot runtime.

Official status: The toolkit, manifest schema, and runtime are evolving. Watch the Teams manifest schema repo for updates.

Let me know if you need sample code or help with manifest config!

✨We'd love your feedback! Please take a moment to fill out our survey.

---

Note: This is an automated first response generated by AI. A human team member will review your issue and provide a more detailed response soon. We appreciate your patience!

[microsoft-github-policy-service]

Hi @@Benjiiim! We will investigate and if we require further information we will reach out to you. Please use this link to escalate if you don't get replies in two working days.

Best regards, Teams Platform

[Prasad-MSFT]

Yes, this is expected behavior.
Currently, Microsoft 365 Copilot uses the personal scope command list from your Teams app manifest, even if you specify a separate command list for the copilot scope.

Details:

• The copilot scope in the manifest is intended for future extensibility and clarity, but as of now, Copilot only recognizes and uses commands defined under the personal scope.
• The copilot scope is not yet active for command lists in Copilot; it defaults to personal.

We will highlight this to documentation team and get the document updated

[Benjiiim]

Hi @Prasad-MSFT
Thanks for your quick answer.
This is very unfortunate, as the command list behavior is quite different between Teams and Copilot.
In Teams, when the user is selecting one of the command in the list, the title is used as the message text.
In Copilot, when the user is selecting one of the prompt in the list, the description is used as the message text.
This behaviour difference makes sense when you know the history of Teams bot. A few years ago, the commands lists were used without Gen AI or even basic intent detection. The commands were often a few characters long such as "Help" or "Restart". Nowadays, prompts can be quite long and using the description field as the prompt makes sense.
As developers, we need a way to handle this difference. Using the scope to have one list for Teams and one list for Copilot would really help.

[Prasad-MSFT]

Update:
A bug has been raised a bug for this issue. We will inform you once we get any further update from engineering team. Thanks!

[Benjiiim]

Thanks @Prasad-MSFT
It seems that things are going to improve, with the type and prompt fields that are going to be introduced at some point: MicrosoftDocs/msteams-docs#13363