On September 24, 2026, GitHub introduced a new enterprise-wide setting for Copilot Business and Copilot Enterprise called “Default policy for new features.” It determines whether Copilot features that reach general availability, but that an administrator never explicitly configured, get turned on, stay off, or are left to each organization’s own choice. The setting can be configured right away, but it will not affect user access until October 22, 2026, giving administration teams close to a month to review it.
Three possible values
The setting lives on the enterprise-level “Features & clients” page and accepts three values:
Default policy for new features
├── Enabled -> GA features turned on by default
├── Disabled -> GA features left off by default
└── Let organizations decide -> each organization chooses on its own
With Enabled, any eligible feature, current or future, becomes available to users without further action. With Disabled, those same features remain unavailable until an administrator turns them on explicitly. Let organizations decide hands the decision to each organization under the enterprise, a fit for structures managing several teams with different needs.
What actually changes
| Situation | Behavior from October 22 |
|---|---|
| Feature already manually enabled or disabled | Existing decision is kept; the default policy does not apply |
| Never-configured feature, policy set to Enabled | Turned on automatically |
| Never-configured feature, policy set to Disabled | Stays off until an explicit decision is made |
| Never-configured feature, policy set to Let organizations decide | Each organization chooses independently |
The key distinction is this: only features left in an “unconfigured” state follow the new policy. An administrator who already made a call, in either direction, on a specific Copilot feature keeps that decision.
Copilot governance keeps getting more explicit
The announcement is part of a string of enterprise-facing Copilot settings GitHub has shipped in recent weeks, spanning default model policies and billing controls. It follows the arrival of Grok 4.7 in Copilot for agentic coding, which already widened the set of features and models enterprise admins need to track. As Copilot integrations multiply, so does the risk of missing a silent toggle, which is exactly what a default-policy safety net at the enterprise level addresses. The broader question of governing AI tools inside a company is covered in a dedicated guide on AI for developers.
Preparing for the transition
Between September 24 and October 21, configuring the policy has no effect on user access: it is a preparation window, not a gradual rollout. Teams managing Copilot policy across multiple organizations should use that time to document which features already have an explicit decision, before October 22, to separate what stays stable from what will follow the new default.
A default policy does not replace an explicit decision, it only fills the silence left by its absence.
Check the chosen policy before October 22, 2026: on a multi-organization enterprise, a setting left on “Let organizations decide” can produce different Copilot behavior across teams for the same newly available feature.
Key takeaways
GitHub is formalizing a default safety net for Copilot features nobody explicitly decided on, without touching decisions already made. The actual switch only happens on October 22, 2026, leaving Business and Enterprise administrators time to audit their current settings before the new default applies.
Settings like this one are exactly the kind that end up surprising a production team, because nobody gets an automatic reminder when a policy flips a month later. For enterprises running Copilot across several clients or organizations, auditing this setting before the effective date is well worth the ten minutes it takes. — Simon Janvier
Further reading
Primary source: GitHub Changelog, “Default policy for new Copilot features,” September 24, 2026.
