What is Windows autopilot?

Of all unnecessary re-branding that Microsoft has done with products over the years, I think autopilot actually needs to be renamed to better set expectations. Many admins view it as a set it and forget solution for configuring devices for users. Forget everything you've seen autopilot do. All autopilot does is tie a physical device to Azure and allow you to use the OOBE as a trigger to apply policies.

How Autopilot Differs from other solutions

Typically with traditional deployment solutions you are going to apply custom windows images, then enroll in on premises Active Directory, then apply GPO and sccm policies. You can automate portions of this process but there are usually a number of pain points. When you perform the windows reset the device is typically handled as a fresh device requiring completion of onboarding process again.

With autopilot the device is tied to management at the hardware level. The Autopilot process will force the device to re-connect in azure AD and Intune once OOBE scenario is triggered.

Anything else you have seen Autopilot do is all configured by Intune and Azure ad policies you assign to the device.