Visual Studio Code 1.146.0 has been released, marking the deprecation of the legacy Local agent harness, which will be fully retired by February 2027. Microsoft is transitioning to the Copilot harness, which offers enhanced functionality such as managed sandbox policies and session persistence after closing the editor. The update also introduces new session triage tools, improved security measures, and further integrations aimed at solidifying VS Code's evolution from a simple code editor to an agent orchestration platform. While the Local harness remains usable until its retirement, users are encouraged to adapt to the Copilot harness, which is now the default for new sessions

Visual Studio Code 1.146 Deprecates the Local Agent Harness by February 2027

Visual Studio Code 1.146.0 shipped today as the latest stable release, and its headline move is deprecating the legacy Local agent harness, which will be fully removed by February 2027. Microsoft is standardizing on the Copilot harness, the default for new sessions since 1.143, since it runs on the Agent Host and enforces managed sandbox policies the old runtime can't. Beyond the sunset, the update adds session triage tools like Inbox mode and OS-level chat windows, plus more granular permission prompts and environment-variable masking for sandboxed agents. As always under the now-weekly cadence, it lands as a consolidation step rather than a single marquee feature, cementing VS Code's shift from editor into an agent orchestration platform.

Visual Studio Code 1.146 Deprecates the Local Agent Harness by February 2027 @ NT Compatible