Copilot, ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini: how Belgian companies choose (2026)

Last updated: 31 October 2026. Prices checked on 31 October 2026.

If your company runs on Microsoft 365, start with Copilot; if it runs on Google Workspace, start with Gemini. Add ChatGPT Enterprise or Claude for the teams that write, analyse or code all day and need the strongest models. For Belgian companies, check one thing early: where each tool stores and processes your data.

That is the short answer. The longer one depends on four questions we ask every leadership team: where does your work already live, who will use it every day, where must the data stay, and who will build agents on top of it.

The four assistants at a glance

Sources: vendor pricing, privacy and admin pages, checked on 31 October 2026.

Start from where your work lives

An assistant is only as useful as what it can read. Copilot works inside Word, Excel, Outlook and Teams and answers from your SharePoint and mailbox, within each person’s access rights. Gemini does the same inside Google Workspace. For most office work, the assistant that sits where your documents are wins, even if another model scores higher on a benchmark.

That also means the first problem is rarely the AI. If your SharePoint permissions have never been cleaned up, Copilot will find documents people should not see. Fix access rights before you switch it on for everyone.

When to add ChatGPT Enterprise or Claude

The specialists are worth paying for in teams where AI is the main tool of the day: analysts, marketers, lawyers, developers, consultants. ChatGPT Enterprise is the broadest of the two, with agents and Codex for coding. Claude is strong on long documents, careful writing and code, with Claude Code included.

Both now connect to Microsoft 365 and Google Drive, so the choice is less about data access than it was a year ago. A common setup is Copilot or Gemini for everyone and one specialist tool for the teams that need it.

Where your data stays

For a Belgian company this question often decides the shortlist.

• Microsoft keeps Copilot traffic inside its EU Data Boundary. One exception matters: Copilot can now use Anthropic’s Claude models, and those are outside the boundary and switched off by default for EU customers.

• OpenAI offers European storage and processing for new ChatGPT Enterprise workspaces, not for the Business plan.

• Anthropic has no European region of its own for Claude. Data is stored in the US. If you need EU hosting, Claude models are available through AWS Bedrock or Google Cloud.

• Google offers an EU region for Gemini Enterprise, with exceptions for some models and features.

None of the four trains its models on your business data by default.

Agents: who builds them, and on what

All four now let you build agents that act, not just answer. The differences are in who can build them and how they are governed. Copilot Studio and Agent 365 fit companies that want IT to control agents across Microsoft 365. Gemini’s Workflow Builder plays the same role in Google Workspace. ChatGPT and Claude are more open to power users building their own, with MCP connectors to business systems.

One practical point: OpenAI announced that its Agent Builder closes on 30 November 2026. If you built agents there, plan the move now.

What it really costs

Here is what each vendor lists today for Benelux buyers, per user per month. Microsoft, OpenAI, Anthropic and Google publish euro prices on their local pages. Claude Enterprise and Gemini Enterprise are quoted only in US dollars; we converted those at the ECB reference rate of 30 October 2026 (1 EUR = 1.1172 USD).

Belgian VAT (21%) applies where prices exclude it. Sources: Microsoft’s Belgian Copilot pricing pages, OpenAI’s and Anthropic’s European pricing pages, Google’s Workspace pricing page in euros and Google Cloud’s Gemini Enterprise editions, all public pages checked on 31 October 2026.

List prices are the smallest part of the bill. A 200-person rollout at Copilot’s Belgian list price is about €62,400 a year before VAT. The larger costs are cleaning up data access, training people so they use it more than twice, and building the two or three agents that pay for the rest. Budget for those, or the licences will sit unused.

The AI Act angle

All four vendors have signed the EU’s code of practice for general-purpose AI models. On your side, the AI Act still asks companies to take measures to support the AI literacy of staff who use AI. The rule was softened in July 2026 but remains in force, and national authorities supervise it since 2 August 2026. Training people on the tool you roll out is the simplest way to meet it.

How we would choose

1. List the five to ten tasks you want AI to help with first.

2. Check where the data for those tasks lives and where it is allowed to go.

3. Pilot the assistant that matches your suite with 20 to 50 people for six weeks, and measure use.

4. Add a specialist tool only for the teams that hit its limits.

5. Train everyone before the general rollout.

Agilytic is part of Artefact, an Anthropic Claude partner, an OpenAI Advanced Partner and Google Cloud’s AI Partner of the Year for EMEA, and we roll out Microsoft 365 Copilot ourselves. We help Belgian companies make this choice in an AI roadmap, train teams on the chosen tool (training), and put engineers in the team when agents need to be built into your systems (agentic AI).

The question that usually settles it in an executive committee is a plain one: which tool will people still open in three months?

Frequently asked questions

Is Copilot included in Microsoft 365?

Copilot Chat is included in eligible Microsoft 365 plans. Microsoft 365 Copilot, which works with your documents and email, is a paid add-on, and it is included in the Microsoft 365 E7 plan.

Can we use ChatGPT and Copilot together?

Yes. Many companies do. Set clear rules on which data goes into which tool.

Is Claude GDPR-compliant for a Belgian company?

Anthropic offers enterprise privacy terms and does not train on your data by default, but stores data in the US. If EU hosting is a requirement, use Claude through AWS Bedrock or Google Cloud in an EU region.

Which one is best in French and Dutch?

Microsoft lists French and Dutch as supported languages for Copilot. For the others, test French and Dutch on your own documents during the pilot; quality depends on the language of your sources as much as on the interface.

Do we need a partner to roll this out?

Not to buy licences. A partner helps with data access, training and agents, which decide whether the licences pay off.