Updated ,first published
A widespread outage has hit Microsoft platforms including Outlook, Teams and its Copilot AI chatbot, with many users encountering trouble with accessing or sending emails and other errors across the tech giantโs apps.
Nearly 130,000 users on outage tracker Downdetector reported problems accessing Outlook and other Microsoft services, beginning just before 5am (AEDT). At one point, reports to the platform reached almost 20,000 per minute, stemming from outages across five Microsoft services in 74 countries.
New reports have since fallen from that peak, but many said they couldnโt send and receive emails, or had trouble loading their inboxes.
Thousands also reported issues with Microsoftโs workplace messaging app Teams, as well as its AI assistant Copilot and wider Microsoft 365 services.
The issue has also prevented organisations from sending or responding to emails on Friday morning.
โWhile we havenโt identified any recent changes that correlate with the start of impact, our investigation indicates the failed health checks may originate from a specific component on the affected servers thatโs responsible for processing them,โ Microsoft said in an update on the outage on Friday morning.
โWeโre also investigating why affected servers are experiencing elevated processor usage while handling requests.โ
In earlier updates posted on social media, Microsoft said it was aware of users โexperiencing issues accessing Exchange Online mailboxes.โ
Microsoft later explained that a portion of its infrastructure was โexperiencing elevated loadโ, which it said was โlikely contributing to the connectivity errorsโ. The company determined several servers were โunexpectedly unavailableโ due to a problem that caused them to fail during automated checks.
โWeโre aggressively pursuing all pathways to reduce impact,โ the Microsoft 365 Status account wrote on X.
Earlier in the day, the company said it had โsuccessfully restoredโ problems related to Microsoft Teams in North America, although some users continued to report connectivity issues.
with AP
The Business Briefing newsletter delivers major stories, exclusive coverage and expert opinion. Sign up to get it every weekday morning.
Jack Gramenz is a breaking news reporter at The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via email.From our partners
About the Author
