GitHub Copilot, the AI-powered coding assistant from Microsoft-owned GitHub, has now been used by more than 20 million people, according to Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft.
He shared the news during the company’s latest earnings call, and a GitHub spokesperson later confirmed that this figure includes “all-time users,” not active ones.
That means around five million new users tried Copilot in just the last three months. In April, GitHub announced that it had reached 15 million users. While Microsoft hasn’t shared how many of those 20 million are still using Copilot regularly, the number of active daily or monthly users is likely much smaller.
Still, Copilot remains one of the most widely used AI coding tools in the world. Microsoft also said that 90% of Fortune 100 companies are now using it. Enterprise usage of Copilot has grown significantly too — about 75% more than the previous quarter.
Unlike general AI chatbots like ChatGPT or Google’s Gemini, which serve hundreds of millions of users each month, coding tools like Copilot target a smaller but more specialized audience. But it’s a valuable one. Developers and tech companies seem more than willing to pay for tools that make software development faster and easier. Nadella even said Copilot is now a bigger business than GitHub was when Microsoft first bought it in 2018.
Meanwhile, Copilot faces rising competition. Cursor, another AI coding platform, is positioning itself as a serious rival — especially in the enterprise space. In March, Bloomberg reported Cursor had over a million daily users and was bringing in around $200 million in annual recurring revenue. Now, that figure has jumped to over $500 million, suggesting even more people are using Cursor every day.
The two tools are also beginning to look more alike. Both GitHub and Cursor have recently rolled out AI agents that can review code and flag bugs. They’re also working on agents that handle entire coding workflows, helping developers save time by automating repetitive tasks. Nadella said GitHub is seeing strong momentum in this area.
GitHub isn’t alone in the race. Google has entered the space by acquiring the founders of Windsurf, a promising AI coding startup. Cognition, the company behind AI developer “Devin,” has also brought on the rest of Windsurf’s team. And major AI labs like OpenAI and Anthropic are building their own coding tools — powered by their in-house models, Codex and Claude Code — hoping to grab a share of this fast-growing market.
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AI coding assistants might not be as mainstream as AI chatbots just yet, but the competition is clearly ramping up. With enterprise demand rising and a wave of innovation underway, this space could become one of the biggest battlegrounds in the AI industry.
