GitHub’s recent wave of updates for Copilot and its tooling is centered on making the CLI and agent features more interactive and context-aware. The January 21 changelog entry, GitHub Copilot CLI — plan before you build, steer as you go, outlines several workflow-oriented additions that pair with the broader Copilot ecosystem changes rolled out across early January.
What the Copilot CLI adds The CLI updates emphasize interactive decision-making during development rather than only post‑hoc suggestions. Key additions include:
- **Interactive plan mode** — enables creating and reviewing a stepwise plan before code generation, helping to align agent actions with intended design.
- **Approve for session** — a session-level approval flow that reduces repetitive confirmations during longer agent-driven tasks.
- **Configurable reasoning effort** — controls for how much internal reasoning the agent should expend, trading latency for depth of analysis when necessary.
- **Inline feedback on rejection** — allows succinct feedback to be attached to rejected suggestions, improving future responses.
These features complement the recently introduced **agentic memory system**, which keeps shared memory across development workflows. Together, the CLI controls and shared memory aim to make multi-step, agent-driven workflows more predictable and iterative.
For the full changelog entry and links to each update, see: https://github.blog/changelog/2026-01-21-github-copilot-cli-plan-before-you-build-steer-as-you-go