GitHub Copilot CLI is getting a major refresh at Microsoft Build 2026. Rubber duck, prompt scheduling, and voice input are generally available today, and a new experimental terminal interface—including tabs for working with issues, pull requests, and gists—is available to try via /experimental
.
A new terminal experience (experimental) We’re previewing a redesigned terminal interface for Copilot CLI. You get a cleaner layout, theme-aware semantic colors, and responsive components that adapt to narrow terminals without truncating the things you need to read.
The biggest visible change is the introduction of tabs. When you use the CLI in a GitHub repository, you can press Tab to switch between the default Session view, tabs for the repository’s Issues and Pull requests, and a tab for your personal Gists. This lets you view issues, pull requests, and gists without leaving Copilot CLI.
The redesign also makes Copilot CLI more accessible:
- Pick from new color modes (e.g.,
default
,github
,dim
,high-contrast
, andcolorblind
) to match your terminal and your eyes. - Screen reader support is on by default when a screen reader is detected, with labeled icons and animations that automatically disable.
- Dialogs, tables, lists, and headings render consistently across every screen in the CLI.
The new terminal experience is available in /experimental
mode. Run /experimental on
to opt in. The new experience is still evolving, and we’d love your feedback as we move toward general availability.
Get a second opinion with rubber duck Rubber duck is a built-in CLI agent that acts as a constructive critic. While working on a task, the main CLI agent for a session can pass its current plan, design, implementation, or tests over to the rubber duck agent for review. The rubber duck agent looks for blind spots, design flaws, and substantive issues, and reports back with concrete, actionable feedback. Copilot then takes that critique into account before continuing.
For some tasks, two heads are better than one, and the CLI decides when getting a second opinion may be beneficial.
[Schedule prompts with /every and /after](#schedule-prompts-with-every-and-after)
The new /every
and /after
slash commands let you schedule a prompt or skill within the current CLI session.
Use /every
to schedule a prompt to run repeatedly at the specified interval:
/every 30m run the frontend tests
/every 1h how many tokens have I used during the past hour
Use /after
to schedule a prompt to run just once, after the specified interval:
/after 2h /example-skills:docx create a new file summarizing recent changes to this repo
Run /every
or /after
with no arguments to open the schedule manager, where you can see active schedules and delete any you no longer want to run.
Talk to Copilot
Copilot CLI now includes hands-free dictation. Hold the space bar on your keyboard and talk to input a prompt. Alternatively, press Ctrl+ X followed by V to start recording, speak your prompt, then press any key to stop recording and insert the transcription.
Voice input runs locally, so all audio you record stays on your machine. The first time you enable voice input, the CLI guides you through down the runtime and picking a speech-to-text model.
Update and share feedback
Update GitHub Copilot CLI by running copilot update
in your terminal. We’d love to hear what you think—share feedback with the /feedback
command in a CLI session or open an issue in our public repository.