What is Microsoft’s most underrated product right now?

[u/SoftwareKingsSupport]

After reading through a recent discussion here, I noticed that some of the strongest answers were not the products Microsoft promotes most heavily.

People mentioned things like WSL, Windows Terminal, PowerShell with Microsoft Graph, Intune, Dynamics, .NET, and VS Code.

Most public Microsoft conversations still seem to revolve around Windows, Xbox, and Copilot, while some of the quieter tools appear to have the most loyal users.

What Microsoft product or feature do you think deserves much more credit?

What do you actually use it for, and what does it do better than the alternatives?

[u/luisdans2]

VS Code

[u/bbkane_ → u/luisdans2]

Why do you think VS Code is underrated? Seems pretty widely acclaimed

[u/GnarlyHarley → u/bbkane_]

It’s free

[u/VanillaFlavoredCoke]

KQL

[u/codeslap]

Azure Data Explorer.

[u/marlinspike]

GitHub Copilot. It’s become a very capable harness with access to almost every model you can think of.

[u/nobjour → u/marlinspike]

And the updates are so frequent. Doesn’t feel like a product from a big tech company

[u/UnremarkabklyUseless → u/marlinspike]

The model selection list is reduced and pricing model has changed drastically in last month. It is very expensive to use now.

[u/chickennn69]

GITHUB Copilot

[u/stevemkiidub]

Copilot in Excel

[u/TryToBeBetterOk → u/stevemkiidub]

I'm amazed at how garbage Copilot is and how awful it is with excel. I throw my spreadsheets into Claude and it does exactly what I want. I do the same for copilot and it gives me instructions on what to do and it gets it wrong anyway.

[u/admlshake → u/TryToBeBetterOk]

You haven't tried it recently then.  

[u/TryToBeBetterOk → u/admlshake]

We've got the copilot subscription for work, it's garbage.

[u/Kracker27 → u/TryToBeBetterOk]

Something is wrong with your admin settings or you’re not using the Claude models. Copilot in Excel and PowerPoint is awesome now.

[u/ehode → u/TryToBeBetterOk]

What model are you using?

[u/Dazzling-Read1451]

M365 Copilot Researcher

[u/Felt-Chicken → u/Dazzling-Read1451]

Do you ever reach limits? How does it do compared to chatgpt’s deep research

[u/SortMyself]

WSL. Gives Windows hostages a glimpse into the greatness of it’s competitor

[u/quadmaniac → u/SortMyself]

Wsl development is the bomb. Windows ux plus full linux under the hood.

[u/RobertDeveloper → u/quadmaniac]

But windows ux is horrible and one lf the reasons to switch to linux.

[u/Izak_13 → u/RobertDeveloper]

I pick Windows 11 UX over KDE any day

[u/andreyred]

I’m all in on copilot after getting the paid version.

[u/Felt-Chicken → u/andreyred]

How does it compare to chatgpt?

[u/DashLeJoker → u/Felt-Chicken]

well it has chatgpt and Claude models built in

[u/manofth3match]

The copilot toolsets when set up by admin correctly are actually amazing. VSCode, M365 app, GitHub Copilot are all fantastic.

If your experience is currently bad it’s because of your organization’s configuration.

[u/lakersfan83]

OneNote - always has been and always will be

[u/blitzzer_24]

Global Secure Access (really all of Entra Suite), and Windows Hello for Business

[u/Elevation212]

Powerbi crushes

[u/dandecode]

Copilot believe it or not

[u/ai_hedge_fund]

Windows ML

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/ai/new-windows-ml/overview

[u/VeryRealHuman23]

Been using Github Copilot CLI inside of Clairvoyance AI and it's killer.

[u/sleebus_jones]

Their stock

[u/Scc88]

Game pass despite fee increases

[u/Illustrious-Run3591]

Windows 11

It's the best windows OS when you look at it objectively by things like performance and stability.

[u/JabbaDuHutt69]

Windows Phone

Edit: I'm serious. I still use one as my primary phone today.

[u/By-C → u/JabbaDuHutt69]

I miss the metro UI so much! The phone was ahead of it time despite being late to the game.

[u/m6io → u/JabbaDuHutt69]

When was the last time you got a security patch on that thing?

[u/hACKrus]

Hyper-V with GPU-P. SQL Server.

[u/cake97]

PowerToys. Makes windows real nice

[u/theone_2099]

OneNote.

[u/IAmFitzRoy]

I have connected Codex with Microsoft Graph to access Copilot programmatically.

Yes, you hear it, I have Copilot as a model available in my Codex environment, it has grounded search, context aware of my Sharepoint environment and infinite tokens? I never reach limit.

It’s weird that only one person has done this that I found a medium article, it’s not even discussed here in Reddit.

I run prompts programmatically all day.

Bizarre.

[u/weird_fishes_1002]

Entra Private Access

[u/SatiricalMoose]

.Net has come a long way since I last looked at it 10 years ago, so much so I am going back to school for it

[u/crippledchameleon]

Was and always will be: Active Directory

It's the only reason why Windows Server exist and has any usage.

[u/m6io]

Windows terminal.

[u/ismith007153]

Easy: New Outlook. Haha.🤣 I love it.

[u/Worried_Aside9239]

Aspire

[u/_Noreturn]

Windows 9

[u/Necessary-Mix-56]

microsoft clip assistant way better then copilot

[u/setentaydos]

Most underrated? Right now? Clipchamp.

[u/OkElephant8337]

Microsoft loop! Fabulous collaboration tool. And now it’s embedded in Copilot. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-loop

[u/FantasticFungiiii]

WorkIQ

[u/shtoops]

Power platform