# GitHub Copilot Chat

10 Hacker News commenters recommended GitHub Copilot Chat and 6 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 7 of 13 months.

**Verdict:** People recommend it for in-editor agentic coding in VS Code, with good results on whole-file generation. Critics say it lags in large sessions and feels worse after recent updates.

## Why people recommend it

- Good agentic integration inside VS Code (2 comments): "The VS code copilot chat extension has really nice integration for 'human in the loop' style agentic development." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48245792)) "This gives us all the features of a top harness (vs code)" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48239943))
- Good results generating whole files (2 comments): "was able to create entire files with no memory errors on the first try for me" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46212564)) "I've had outstansingly impressive results asking Copilot Chat with Sonnet 4.5" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46295617))
- Chat agent praised and improving (2 comments): "The GitHub Copilot chat agent is great." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46699244)) "already improves the experience a lot" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46949072))

## What people warn about

- Recent versions feel worse or broken (4 comments): "The underlying code for vscode github copilot chat has turned to shit." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46737294)) "VSCode Copilot Chat has become completely unusable." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46855353)) "Why does the copilot chat not work? It doesn't." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49944893))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [Hax coding agent](https://hackerapproved.com/p/hax.md): 28 recommend
- [Roo Code](https://hackerapproved.com/p/roo-code.md): 26 recommend
- [Qwen Code](https://hackerapproved.com/p/qwen-code.md): 25 recommend
- [MiMo Code](https://hackerapproved.com/p/mimo-code.md): 24 recommend
- [Mysti](https://hackerapproved.com/p/mysti.md): 10 recommend

## Where to get it

- [Visit the official site](https://github.com/features/copilot)

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "GitHub Copilot Chat", https://hackerapproved.com/p/github-copilot-chat/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).