Microsoft now lets customers run agents on Windows 365 cloud PCs

Microsoft has unveiled a new type of Windows 365 cloud PC that provides a secure environment for running “computer use” AI agents.

Windows 365 for Agents, announced at the company’s Ignite conference this week, is built on the same foundations as existing W365 products, but “optimized” for agentic workloads. 

Windows 365 for Agents lets customers create pools of Windows or Linux cloud PCs that are accessed once a user invokes an AI agent. When the agent has completed its task, the virtual desktop is returned to the pool — ready to be used again by another agent. 

The idea is to provide a secure environment to run computer use agents that interact with applications autonomously on behalf of a human user. As with other W365 products, Windows 365 for Agents virtual desktop is subject to a customer’s enterprise security policies, connected to Microsoft Entra and managed via Intune.

“Doing this inside of the cloud gives you security, as well as elasticity,” Scott Manchester, vice president for Windows Cloud at Microsoft, said in a briefing with Computerworld. “Everything is isolated in this environment.”

One example is an expense reporting agent. An employee can direct the agent to fill in an expense form. The agent then navigates the expense application that’s installed on the isolated virtual desktop, inputting the relevant data. The employee can observe the agent’s actions and take over if necessary. An auditable record of agent actions is also created.

Microsoft already uses Windows 365 for Agents for agents in its own products, including the Researcher agent for Copilot, a computer use feature in Copilot Studio, and Project Opal feature, a new agentic tool coming to Microsoft 365 Copilot.

For developers, Windows 365 for Agents enables the creation of “enterprise-ready agents that run on secure, policy-controlled cloud PCs,” said Stefan Kinnestrand, vice president of Windows Commercial marketing at Microsoft. “They don’t have to worry about the infrastructure layer, they can just focus on the agent themselves.”

Windows 365 for Agents shows promise as an approach to managing and securing agents, said Tom Mainelli, IDC group vice president, device and consumer research. “Running agents in Cloud PCs should improve security and control, although it will also add cost and complexity,” he said. “Adoption will likely start slowly until Microsoft shows it can make large-scale agent management practical.”

The tool costs 40 cents per hour, with customers charged for the duration of a computer use task, rounded up to the next full hour. The feature is currently in preview, with a waitlist here. 

Microsoft also announced it will make some of AI features that are exclusive to Copilot+ PCs available on Windows 365 cloud PCs. This includes enhanced Windows search and Click to Do, which lets users interact with text and images displayed on their desktop. 

These “AI-enabled Cloud PCs” won’t require the neural processing unit (NPU) chips that are used to run AI features in Copilot+ PCs.

“Since Cloud PCs don’t have NPUs, they’ve missed out on the Copilot features that leverage local AI capabilities,” said Gabe Knuth, principal analyst at Omdia. “This is an attempt to bring those experiences more in-line with each other, at least in terms of productivity and search.”

The AI-enabled Cloud PC is currently in preview.