Unpacking the Knowledge Agent in SharePoint – notes for technical and compliance teams

Microsoft has recently introduced the Knowledge Agent in SharePoint (in preview as of September 2025), a new Microsoft 365 Copilot for SharePoint capability that brings some structured information management  capabilities directly into end-users’ hands. The feature makes it possible to automatically generate columns, views, and rules that help organise content in document libraries. For technical and compliance teams, this marks an important shift: capabilities that were once controlled (although often through obscurity) by administrators or information architects can now be initiated by site owners and members with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license (check out the official Microsoft blog about the release here). 

The implications are twofold.

On the one hand, Knowledge Agent has the potential to accelerate adoption of better metadata practices across large volumes of content within a list or a library. This is great for both our Atlas customers, but also for other organisations that have a good handle on their information architecture and governance.

On the other, for those that do not, it introduces governance challenges in areas such as change management, auditability, and standardisation. With tenant-wide enablement and relatively light configuration controls, organisations will need to consider carefully how to balance the power of automation with the need for oversight.

My aim is to provide guidance to help you make the Knowledge Agent sing as the feature matures over time! This blog unpacks the technical set-up, current limitations, and governance considerations of the Knowledge Agent in its preview release. I hope this helps to provide SharePoint administrators, compliance leads, and technical teams with a clear view of what the feature can (and cannot) do today, and to highlight the points where further preparation and guardrails may be required before general availability.

Enabling Knowledge Agent for SharePoint

You will need to use PowerShell for this and authenticate with an account that has tenant-level SharePoint admin permissions.

Configuration limitations

Today in preview, you are limited to running the Knowledge Agent in three modes across your SharePoint tenant:

• Tenant-wide off
• Tenant-wide on for all sites
• Tenant-wide on, but excluding specific sites (with a current max of up to 100)

To be clear, it is not possible to turn the feature on against a list of sites to include. I.e. if you only want to run the Knowledge Agent in a single site, you will have to exclude all other sites. Keeping in mind that you can maximum exclude 100 sites.

Running the PowerShell to enable Knowledge Agent for SharePoint

For preview, Microsoft has released the admin toggle with the “KnowledgeAgent” parameter in SET-SPOTenant.

Tip: You will need to use SharePoint Online Management Shell (version 16.0.26413.12010 or later) which means that you need to run this in PowerShell 5 as far as I can tell (I am not a PowerShell guy though).

If you simply want to enable the Knowledge Agent for all sites, you run this command:

Set-SPOTenant -KnowledgeAgentScope AllSites

It is likely that you prefer to only run it – at least initially – for a few select sites. This is unfortunately not possible. You can however *exclude* it from up to 100 specific sites which you define in list of selected sites for exclusion. I hope this limitation is dealt with soon by Microsoft as it will limit most organisations from running small controlled trials.

You can create this list (an array) by adding the exclusion site, separated with commas into an array as follows:

Set-SPOTenant -KnowledgeAgentSelectedSitesList @("siteurlA", "siteurlB")

You can include the “append” option to the command it will add an additional site (or sites) into the array:

Set-SPOTenant ‘
-KnowledgeAgentSelectedSitesList @("siteurlC”) ‘
-KnowledgeAgentSelectedSitesListOperation Append

You can now enable the KnowledgeAgent to all sites, except those in the exclusion list as follows:

Set-SPOTenant -KnowledgeAgentScope ExcludeSelectedSites

Check the current configuration like this:

Get-SPOTenant | Select-Object KnowledgeAgentScope

And disable the Knowledge Agent (from all sites) again like this:

Set-SPOTenant -KnowledgeAgentScope NoSites

Microsoft’s full guidance is here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-gb/sharepoint/knowledge-agent-get-started

Microsoft limitations and recommendations

Please see the most up-to-date list here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-gb/sharepoint/knowledge-agent-organize-files#requirements-and-limitations

Important ones to note: Only *the first 100* terms of a mapped term set will be considered if you are using Managed Metadata columns.

Licenses, costs and cost controls

Today, in preview, usage is included with Microsoft 365 Copilot license. Whether this shifts to a usage-based model later is not clear. (Please see Roadmap ID: 503145 which indicates support for Pay-As-You-Go for SharePoint Agents, which is slated for General Availability in October 2025. Microsoft 365 Roadmap | Microsoft 365)

Giving access to use the Knowledge Agent

To use the Knowledge Agent, you must have a Microsoft 365 Copilot license assigned and you will need to be a site-owner or a member to see the button for the Knowledge Agent.

In other words, any user with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license will see this feature in any site where they are an owner or a member. Assuming, of course, that the site is not on the Knowledge Agent exclusion list (see above).

Governance of the Knowledge Agent and its actions

The current version of Knowledge Agent for SharePoint is very light on governance. It is currently in preview, so I naturally expect some more controls to be implemented before General Availability. However, if Power Automate governance is anything to go by, organisations will need to quickly get their head around the power that is coming into end-user hands.

Creating rules with Knowledge Agent

A great new feature is the ability to automatically set-up rules. In preview this is however quite limited, but I would expect the capabilities to expand in short order.

In summary, you can create a rule to [carry out an action] under [specific conditions] when [a trigger] occurs.

• The supported triggers today are:
  • a new item is created
  • an item is modified
  • an item is deleted
• The actions that can be carried out are:
  • email
  • move
  • copy
  • set value.

Note the following key limitations for larger teams:

• A maximum of 15 rules can be created per list or library.

• Rules don't support email-enabled security groups for notifications.

The combination of these two limitations makes the use of rules very limited for larger teams in collaboration within a single library or list.

Please see updated requirements and limitations here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-gb/sharepoint/knowledge-agent-automate-workflows#requirements-and-limitations

Behind the scenes

What actually happens when you let the Knowledge Agent organize a library for you?

Library settings

To find out, go to the library, click on the settings cog and select “Library Settings”.

(Note: In case you have previously used Syntex, ignore anything related to Microsoft Syntex settings.)

Then click the “More library settings”.

What you should now see is your library settings. If you are working in the default library for a site, you will see “Documents > Settings” up top.

In one of my tests, I was suggested to create “Case name”, “Judgment Date” and “Key Issues”.

The takeaway here is that while Knowledge Agent cleverly creates new columns, the columns are unlikely to follow typical enterprise standards for column naming and configuration.

Search settings

As far as our initial tests have shown, the new columns that are created become searchable, but no other changes are made to the search schema. In other words, the Knowledge Agent doesn’t magically create new search schema settings.

Power Automate integration with Knowledge Agent

Apart from the Rules that can be suggested and created using the Knowledge Agent, there are no specific Knowledge Agent triggers or actions available for Power Automate integration. On the as-soon-as-possible-wish-list would be a trigger to initiate a Power Automate workflow when changes have been made using the Knowledge Agent. At least then the Administrators and Site Owners can be notified if new columns have been created.

Closing comments

The Knowledge Agent for in SharePoint is still at an early stage, but it already introduces significant capabilities that will shape how content is structured and managed in SharePoint. For technical teams, the immediate priority is understanding how to enable and configure the feature at tenant level, and where the current limitations sit. For compliance teams, the focus should be on recognising the governance gaps: limited auditability, lack of standardisation controls, and the risk of inconsistent application across sites.

In practical terms, organisations should test the feature in controlled environments, establish internal guidance for site owners and members, and plan for monitoring once Knowledge Agent is more widely deployed. Keeping track of Microsoft’s roadmap and updates will also be critical, as the preview functionality is likely to expand rapidly.

It goes without saying that enterprise-wide governance of your information architecture, your taxonomy and how tags are applied has become more crucial than ever. If you want Microsoft 365 Copilot and Knowledge Agent in SharePoint to sing, you need to orchestrate it well. 

By preparing now, technical and compliance teams can ensure they are ready to harness the benefits of Knowledge Agent, while also protecting against the risks that come with putting new automation tools directly into the hands of end users.