September 2026 brings three concrete updates to GitHub Copilot inside Visual Studio 2026: a Git‑agent that can explore pull requests from chat, a preview of Bring‑Your‑Own‑Model (BYOM) that now runs only in the new Agent mode, and a fixer action for NuGet audit warnings directly from the Error List. Each change is scoped to the IDE and requires explicit configuration, but together they reduce context‑switching and open new automation paths for engineers.
Git‑agent PR exploration
The Git agent can be invoked from Copilot Chat. After selecting the agent, you attach a pull request from the Git Repository window as context. Copilot then returns a summary with clickable links to comments and files. This capability works only when the IDE is connected to a supported MCP server – GitHub or Azure DevOps – and therefore requires network access to those provider endpoints.
Bring‑Your‑Own‑Model preview
BYOM moves to preview and is enabled by default across Community, Professional, and Enterprise editions. It lets teams route Copilot queries to a model of their choice – Microsoft Foundry, OpenAI, Anthropic, or Ollama – regardless of GitHub sign‑in status. The preview introduces a breaking change: BYOM now depends on the new Agent (Preview) built on the Copilot SDK harness. The older Ask and Agent modes no longer support BYOM, so any previously configured Ollama models must be re‑added after the update. This shift may affect existing automation that relied on the legacy modes.
NuGet vulnerability auto‑fix
NuGet audit warnings displayed in the Error List now include a fixer button. Clicking it opens Copilot Chat in agent mode and asks the model to remediate the vulnerable packages via the NuGet MCP server. The action requires a signed‑in Copilot session and the NuGet MCP server to be enabled from the Copilot Chat tools menu. All Copilot subscription tiers – Free, Student, Pro, Pro+, Max, Business, and Enterprise – receive this capability.
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What This Means For Practitioners
- Configuration overhead: Verify MCP server connectivity for GitHub, Azure DevOps, and NuGet before relying on the new features.
- Model management: Re‑add any custom Ollama endpoints after upgrading, and evaluate the performance and cost of the supported BYOM providers.
- Security workflow impact: The one‑click NuGet fixer can accelerate patching, but teams should still review the generated changes before committing.
- Operational monitoring: Track usage of the Git agent and BYOM Agent mode to understand latency and reliability in CI/CD pipelines.
- Future watch‑list: Follow the Visual Studio blog for roadmap updates, especially around expanded model support and deeper integration with source‑control workflows.
