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It’s not just you. That service you use is down for everyone else, too.
Whether you’re using a Mac, iPhone, or – shudder – a PC, a major Microsoft outage has disrupted Outlook email and other Microsoft 365 services worldwide. The problems began on Thursday, November 12, and continued overnight into Friday, affecting businesses, schools and public services.
Microsoft said a server process had become overwhelmed, reducing capacity. Recovery proved difficult because some servers became unresponsive again as traffic returned. Features that depend on Exchange Online were particularly affected, although not every function within each Microsoft service stopped working.
A look at Downdetector and ThousandEyes Outages also showed complaints involving unrelated platforms. However, those reports don’t establish that every service was down or that they shared Microsoft’s underlying problem. Amazon told Macworld that AWS was operating normally. Some users also reported problems with iMessage, although Apple’s System Status page showed no corresponding outage at the time.
Microsoft reported signs of recovery as it restarted affected infrastructure and managed traffic, but had not provided a confirmed time for full restoration. The company had not established a final root cause and said there was no indication that malicious activity was responsible.
Settle in, and here’s hoping it’s fixed soon. You can track the Microsoft service health here, and we’ll keep this article updated as we learn more.
Update 11:45 am GMT / 6.45 am ET: Recovery underway
Microsoft says it has completed recovery actions in Asia-Pacific and this recovery work is being extended to other regions, as per the Guardian’s live blog.
Update 10:15 am GMT / 5.15 am ET: The U.K. has woken up to the Microsoft outage
Microsoft’s service disruption continued into Friday, November 13, affecting Outlook email and Microsoft 365 features that depend on Exchange Online.
The disruption has affected NHS communications, with reports of NHS trusts, including Evelina London, a children’s healthcare provider, unable to send or receive emails.
Elsewhere, police forces have confirmed that some online reporting forms could be affected, but their ability to answer and respond to 999 and 101 calls had not been compromised.
Schools have also reported communication problems and asked parents to telephone rather than email their child’s school.
Microsoft’s Friday morning advisory, via the University of Pennsylvania’s Microsoft incident-report feed, says most core Teams calling, meetings and messaging functionality is unaffected, although calendar and other email-dependent features can fail.
Microsoft reported early signs of stabilization on Friday morning, but said capacity had not returned to normal and recovery remained uneven.
Update 9:45 pm ET: “Positive results”
Microsoft reported “seeing positive results” with its efforts to correct the outage as it restarted affected infrastructure and brought servers back into service in isolation.
Update 4:39 pm ET: AWS is normal
An Amazon spokesperson reached out to Macworld to let us know that AWS is functioning normally and has been all day.
Any disruptions today would have to be caused by something else.
Update 2:00 pm ET: The whole Internet is having major issues right now
Whether you’re using a Mac, iPhone, or – shudder – a PC, you may be having trouble accessing Outlook email and other Microsoft 365 services.
Downdetector and ThousandEyes Outages are recording widespread reports of connectivity problems. Users have also reported issues with unrelated platforms, although those reports do not establish that every service is down or that they share the same underlying cause.
Some users are reporting problems with Apple services, including iMessage, but Apple’s System Status page shows no corresponding outage at the time of writing.
OpenAI and Anthropic have also reported disruption to the tools that connect their AI assistants to Microsoft 365. For ChatGPT users who connect Microsoft services, this could interrupt tasks that depend on retrieving information from those services.
The cause and expected restoration time remain unclear. We’ll update this live blog as providers confirm more information.
