Microsoft 365 outage hits Outlook and Teams as Friday 13 begins

Users of Microsoft systems across the World face disruption after overnight recovery attempts fail.

Millions of people relying on Microsoft services are struggling to access email and workplace tools as a worldwide Microsoft 365 outage continues into Friday, November 13.

Problems began on Thursday, when users reported issues with Exchange Online, the cloud system behind Outlook. Some cannot open mailboxes through the website or desktop app, while others are seeing messages delayed or failing to send.

Problems have been reported across Europe, the UK, Australia and parts of Asia as workers log on for the day. Downdetector recorded nearly 130,000 Outlook problem reports at the peak in the United States, although the number later fell.

Outlook and Teams among services affected

Outlook is bearing the brunt, but the impact reaches beyond email. Microsoft says parts of Teams, Copilot, SharePoint Online, OneDrive, Defender, Planner and other Microsoft 365 services may also be affected.

Teams messaging and online meetings can still work for many users, but functions relying on Exchange Online, including calendars and meeting scheduling, may fail. Direct access to files stored in SharePoint is not necessarily affected.

Microsoft says infrastructure across several regions is carrying an unusually heavy load. A process handling secure connections on affected servers is becoming overwhelmed, causing some machines to stop responding. Servers brought back into service have sometimes failed again when traffic returns.

Microsoft rules out cyberattack

Charles Lamanna, Microsoft’s executive vice-president for Copilot, says there is no indication the outage was caused by malicious activity or a cyberattack.

Engineers are restarting servers, changing configurations and redirecting traffic. However, Microsoft has said some earlier fixes have not worked as expected. No confirmed time for full restoration has been given.

People relying on Microsoft 365 can check the company’s official service status page and Microsoft 365 Status updates.

Friday’s disruption recalls the worldwide IT chaos of July 2024, when a faulty CrowdStrike update affected airlines, businesses and public services. Euro Weekly News covered the Microsoft outage that left airports issuing handwritten boarding passes, although that incident had a different cause.

Microsoft 365 users should avoid repeatedly resending emails, as delayed messages may still be delivered when services recover.