GitHub Chief Operating Officer Kyle Daigle has said that AI agents could become bigger users of GitHub’s services than human developers. In an interview published by Moneycontrol on 2 November 2026, Daigle said GitHub serves 225 million developers and that there is virtually no upper limit to how many AI agents each of them can deploy.

“If every of those 225 million developers brings 100 agents, the math alone says that there are more agents building and using more services from GitHub,” Daigle said. The comments come as Microsoft-owned GitHub lets enterprises access GitHub Copilot capabilities through AI credits rather than only through separate subscriptions, a shift that ties more of its revenue to AI consumption.

Why GitHub AI agents matter for its business

Daigle said GitHub now has about 50 million people using Copilot every day and 140,000 organisations that have adopted it. Usage of Copilot’s cloud agent has grown by 230 per cent, and developers made 13.5 billion contributions on the platform in 2026, more than in 2024 and 2025 combined.

He said developers have moved from working with one coding assistant at a time to running several agents at once, sometimes inside a single project. Autonomous coding tools are multiplying fast, from DeepSeek’s open-source super-agent for autonomous coding to a Git platform built for AI coding agents launched by former GitHub CEO Thomas Dohmke.

From token maxxing to ROI maxxing

More agents also mean bigger AI bills for enterprises. GitHub’s answer is Copilot Fusion, which switches between AI models based on task complexity, performance and cost. Fusion can start a task on a cheaper model, move to a more capable one when needed, and bring in a second model to check the first model’s work.

Daigle said GitHub’s own teams and early enterprise customers are seeing 50 to 60 per cent lower costs on complex work, with savings of up to 77 per cent on some workloads and delivery about 40 per cent faster. He described the change in focus as a move from “token maxxing”, or consuming more AI tokens, to “ROI maxxing of agents”, where companies measure the value their AI investments deliver.

What it means for India’s developers and IT services firms

India is one of GitHub’s fastest-growing developer bases. Daigle said India added 9.34 million developers to GitHub over the past year and now has around 31 million developers on the platform across startups and enterprises.

The implications reach Indian IT services companies, whose model has long depended on large engineering teams. Daigle said fleets of AI agents could complete projects in far less time than traditional teams, but argued that the real advantage will lie in picking the right problems and taking software from idea to production. Indian providers are already responding, with Indian IT majors betting on policing AI agents and NxtGen planning a SpeedCode coding agent for Indian engineering teams.

Key takeaways

• Agents as customers: GitHub expects AI agents, not just people, to drive future demand for its services.
• Cost control: Copilot Fusion routes work across models and, according to GitHub, cuts costs on complex work by 50 to 60 per cent.
• India’s scale: about 31 million Indian developers are on GitHub, after 9.34 million joined in the past year.

FAQ

What did GitHub’s COO say about AI agents?

Kyle Daigle said AI agents could become bigger consumers of GitHub’s services than its 225 million human developers, because each developer can deploy many agents.

What is GitHub Copilot Fusion?

Copilot Fusion is a GitHub feature that switches between AI models by task complexity, performance and cost, and can use a second model to check the first model’s work.

How many developers does India have on GitHub?

Daigle said India has around 31 million developers on GitHub and added 9.34 million in the past year.

Featured image: GitHub COO Kyle Daigle. Photo: GitHub

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