On April 20, 2026, GitHub announced changes to its Copilot Individual plans. The three tiers—Free, Pro, and Pro+—have been reorganized, clearly distinguishing feature sets and clarifying eligibility for commercial use.
Across custom development teams, using personal subscriptions for professional work has often become an unwritten norm. Following these changes, projects that lag in rationalizing their licensing face mounting audit risks. This article breaks down what changed and provides decision criteria for custom development teams.
Summary of changes
According to GitHub's announcement, the changes center around three primary axes:
| Axis | Previous | New |
|---|---|---|
| Plan structure | Individual / Business / Enterprise | Free / Pro / Pro+ / Business / Enterprise |
| Positioning of Pro+ | Unclear | All-inclusive tier designed for individual developers |
| Commercial use | Virtually possible even on the Individual plan | Business or higher recommended |
In particular, the message "If you use it for work, please subscribe to Business" has become clearer than before, making it easier for using individual plans for business to be viewed as problematic. This follows the same trend as the Copilot AI training opt-out changes, serving as an extension of the policy to strengthen privacy and license governance.
What issues arise in custom development
Here are three common operational patterns in custom development teams. Each has become a target for review under the recent changes.
| Operational pattern | Issue | Recommended action |
|---|---|---|
| Individual engineers subscribe to Individual Pro and expense receipts | Working on client code using an individual plan → Concern over licensing violations | Switch to Business |
| Development company subscribes to Business and assigns seats to members | Acceptable under the contract, but raises different issues when used in client environments | Check NDA and contracts |
| Client subscribes to Enterprise and assigns seats to contractors | Clean at first glance, but revoking permissions upon departure is frequently overlooked | Establish offboarding procedures |
With the third pattern of lending Enterprise accounts, forgetting to suspend accounts when contractor members depart leads to security incidents. It is safer for the custom development side to also proactively propose "clearly specifying the revocation of permissions upon departure in the contract."
Selection flow: Choosing the right plan for your team
The selection flow when building a development team for client projects is as follows.
1. 業務利用するか？ → No: Free / Pro でよい
→ Yes: 2 へ
2. クライアントコードに触れるか？ → No: 個人 Pro+ でも可
→ Yes: 3 へ
3. クライアントが Enterprise / Business を持っているか？
→ Yes: クライアントから付与してもらう
→ No: 受託会社で Business 契約 → 4 へ
4. データ取り扱いの NDA はあるか？ → 必ず締結Evaluating in this order makes it practical for a custom development company to maintain at least one Business subscription. Pro+ is positioned primarily for personal development and OSS use cases, and is not recommended as the primary plan for commercial work.
Implementation considerations for the Business plan
When running commercial operations on the Business plan, make sure to explicitly configure the following three settings.
# .github/copilot.yml の例
content_exclusions:
- "**/*.env"
- "**/secrets/**"
- "credentials.json"
policies:
block_public_code_matches: true
ai_training_opt_out: true
audit_logging: true| Setting | Application |
|---|---|
content_exclusions | Exclude confidential files from Copilot context |
block_public_code_matches | Suppress suggestions matching public code (prevent license contamination) |
ai_training_opt_out | Turn off sharing data for training |
audit_logging | Retain usage logs and use them for audit compliance |
If Business is introduced without these configurations, an incident can occur where the client complains: "We accepted it assuming it was protected by settings, but the settings were empty." The desirable operational approach is for the custom development team to handle setup all the way through delivery.
Template clauses for Copilot usage agreements in client projects
When assigning engineers to client environments on custom development projects, including the following clauses in the agreement will reduce incidents.
- Specification of AI coding assistant tools used: Copilot / Cursor / Claude Code, etc.
- Opt-out policy for training data contribution: Turned off by default
- Handling of copyright for generated code: Copyright of entire deliverables transferred to client
- Scope of responsibility for license contamination risk from generated code: Obligation to enable "Block public code matches"
- Account revocation process upon departure: Revoke within 72 hours
As noted in How to Choose a Web Development Company, when the custom development side can provide this type of contract draft up front, it also has the effect of giving us the initiative in contract negotiations.
Structuring a migration project
When transitioning a team where individual plan usage has become routine to Business, it can be organized as a 3- to 4-week spot project.
| Phase | Period | Details |
|---|---|---|
| Audit | 1 week | List users, contract types, and usage scope |
| Contract execution | 1 week | Execute Business / Enterprise contract and configure SSO integration |
| Configuration setup | 1–2 weeks | Set up content_exclusions, policies, and audit logs |
| Migration | 1 week | Cancel individual plans and assign Business accounts |
Inquiries stating "We want to introduce Copilot, but internal license cleanup can't keep up" are surprisingly common; starting with an audit of current licenses is the fastest path forward.
Summary ─ Ending "using individual plans for work"
The changes to the GitHub Copilot Individual plan are a matter of governance cleanup rather than just tooling. On custom development frontlines, taking this opportunity to wrap up license organization is practical, and being able to deliver contract templates, initial configuration, and audit logging as a comprehensive package turns it into a high-value engagement.
Building teams that combine Copilot with Claude Code workflows is also possible. If you are thinking "we want to organize our licenses" or "we are troubled by questions from clients," please feel free to reach out via our contact form.
