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Copilot chat context

This article describes how to add context to your Copilot chat prompt in Visual Studio Code to help Copilot give you the best and most relevant answers. Copilot supports different types of context, including files, symbols, terminal command output, and more.

Copilot tries to determine the intent and scope of your question based on your natural language chat prompt. To help Copilot give you the best and most relevant answers, add context to your chat prompt or let Copilot find the right files automatically.

Add context to your chat prompt

There are several ways to add context to your chat prompt:

  • VS Code automatically adds the currently active editor as context. If you selected a code block in the editor, only that selection is added as context.

    You can disable adding the active editor for the current request by selecting the disable (eye) icon next to the context item. Use the chat.implicitContext.enabled setting to configure if the active editor should be added automatically for all requests.

    Screenshot of VS Code Copilot Chat view, showing the current editor selection as context.

  • Select the Attach Context (paperclip) icon (Copilot Chat) or Add Files button (Copilot Edits) and then select a type of context from the Quick Pick.

    Screenshot of VS Code Copilot Chat view, showing the Attach context button and context Quick Pick.

    You can attach predefined context types, such as Codebase, or Terminal Selection, or choose files, folders, or symbols from the workspace.

    Tip

    To quickly add multiple items from the attachment Quick Pick, use the Up and Down keys to navigate the list, use the Right key to add the item as context, and then repeat this for other items.

  • Use the context menu Copilot > Add File to Chat on a file in the Explorer or Search view, or Add Selection to Chat for a text selection in the editor.

  • Type the # character in your chat prompt to reference context by using chat variables.

    For example, use #selection to add the current editor selection to your chat prompt, #file to add a workspace file, or #sym to add a symbol from the workspace.

    Screenshot of VS Code Copilot Chat view, showing the chat variable picker.

    Tip

    Type # and use it as an IntelliSense trigger for selecting files or symbols.

  • Drag and drop editor tabs, or files or folders from the Explorer view, Search view, or editor breadcrumb onto the Chat view.

Note

If possible, the full contents of the file will be included when you attach a file. If that is too large to fit into the context window, an outline of the file will be included that includes functions and their descriptions without implementations. If the outline is also too large, then the file won't be part of the prompt.

Let Copilot find the right files automatically

Instead of adding individual files manually, you can let Copilot find the right files from your codebase automatically. This can be useful when you don't know which files are relevant to your question.

To let Copilot find the right files automatically, add #codebase in your prompt or select Codebase from the list of context types.

Make sure to enable the github.copilot.chat.codesearch.enabled (preview) setting to get the best results.

Add context for fixing problems

When you encounter issues in your code, or have failures when running tests, you can add specific context to your chat prompt to help Copilot provide the best answer.

  • Drag and drop items from the Problems panel to attach the corresponding issue as context to your prompt.

    Alternatively, select the Problem... from the list of context types, and then select a specific problem from the Quick Pick.

    Screenshot of the Chat view with a problem attached to the chat input field, the result of doing drag and drop of that problem from the Problems panel.

  • Select the Test Failure context type to add the test failure details as context to your prompt.

  • Select Terminal Last Command from the list of context types or type #terminalLastCommand to attach the output of the last command run in the terminal.

Chat context types

Copilot supports the following context types:

  • Files - include specific files from your workspace in the prompt
  • Folders - add a folder to include the files in that folder in the prompt
  • Symbols - add a symbol from your workspace to the prompt
  • Codebase - let Copilot find the right files automatically
  • Editor or terminal selection - include a selection of text from the editor or terminal in the prompt
  • Terminal command output - include the output of the last command run in the terminal
  • Problems - include a specific code issue from the Problems panel to the prompt
  • Test failures - include details from test failures in the prompt

Related resources

03/05/2025