GitHub open-sources Copilot for Eclipse

GitHub said on May 21 that it had open-sourced GitHub Copilot for Eclipse under the MIT license, making the Eclipse plugin’s code publicly available on GitHub. The company described the move in a changelog post as “an important milestone” for Copilot in the Eclipse ecosystem. The release extends GitHub’s first-party Copilot client lineup for developers who work in Eclipse and Eclipse-based distributions. The code is published in a public repository named `microsoft/copilot-for-eclipse`, which GitHub lists as the home for the “GitHub Copilot plugin for Eclipse IDE.” The repository was publicly accessible on May 22 and showed active development activity, including recent commits and issue tracking. ### What exactly did GitHub release? GitHub’s May 21 changelog entry said Copilot for Eclipse is now open source and available under the MIT license. (github.blog) The post did not describe the move as a new Eclipse launch; instead, it framed the announcement as a licensing and source-availability change for an existing client. The repository page identifies Microsoft as the publisher and describes the project as a Copilot plugin for Eclipse IDE. (github.com) A separate GitHub repository, `eclipse-copilot/eclipse-copilot`, remains online under the EPL-2.0 license, but its page directs visitors to the Microsoft repository “for the latest updates.” ### Where does Eclipse fit in GitHub Copilot’s IDE lineup? GitHub’s changelog said the Eclipse release is part of Copilot’s expansion in the Eclipse ecosystem. (github.blog) The company’s Copilot documentation now includes Eclipse alongside other supported environments in setup, configuration, chat and code-suggestion guides. GitHub’s own documentation and changelog pages show Eclipse as one of the main IDE surfaces now documented for Copilot, alongside Visual Studio Code, JetBrains IDEs, Visual Studio, Xcode and Vim/Neovim. (github.com) The card’s characterization of Eclipse as the third official IDE client aligns with GitHub’s product framing around VS Code, JetBrains and Eclipse as dedicated first-party IDE experiences. That is an inference from GitHub’s published product pages and changelog positioning. (github.blog) ### What can Eclipse users do with Copilot now? GitHub Docs pages published for the Eclipse tool flow say users can install the extension from the Eclipse Marketplace or directly through the Eclipse Update Site. The same documentation set includes Eclipse-specific guides for code suggestions, in-IDE chat and agent-driven workflows. GitHub’s documentation says Copilot in Eclipse supports coding suggestions as users type and can be used for chat-based software-development questions inside the IDE. (docs.github.com) The in-IDE chat documentation also says agents can automate multi-step tasks by reading files, editing code and running commands. ### Was Eclipse support already in place before the open-source move? (docs.github.com) GitHub had been shipping Eclipse updates before this week’s announcement. A July 22, 2025 changelog post said Copilot in Eclipse had added compatibility with Eclipse 2024-03 and 2024-06 and included one-click commit-message generation in the Git Staging view. A GitHub community discussion from 2025 also described agent mode and Model Context Protocol support for Copilot in Eclipse. (docs.github.com) That earlier material indicates the May 21 announcement was about opening the codebase, not introducing Eclipse support for the first time. ### Where can developers find the next step? GitHub’s installation page for Eclipse says developers can download the latest version through the Eclipse Marketplace or from GitHub’s Eclipse Update Site. (github.blog) The public source code is in the `microsoft/copilot-for-eclipse` repository, and GitHub’s Eclipse-specific docs for setup, chat and code suggestions are already live as of May 22. (github.com 1) (github.com 2)