A major global Microsoft outage lingered into a second day on Friday, causing widespread disruptions to government operations, corporate communications, and personal users across more than 70 countries and territories. Services including Outlook, Teams, and the artificial intelligence assistant Copilot experienced significant downtime, impacting operations from Asia to North America and Europe.
The Redmond, Washington-based tech giant stated on Friday that it was seeing "encouraging recovery progress" and noting key improvements in email delivery after resolving the underlying cause. However, Microsoft cautioned that users could still face "intermittent access issues" or "delayed email delivery" as restoration efforts continued, adding by Friday afternoon that it did not yet have an "ETA for full recovery yet."
Microsoft reported "broader improvements" across North America, "sustained improvements across much of Europe," and "encouraging recovery signals" in the Asia-Pacific region. Addressing the widespread disruption in a Friday statement on X, the company expressed regret: "We are deeply sorry for the disruption this incident has caused our customers and partners. We know the trust they place in our services and take that responsibility extremely seriously."
Microsoft first detected the technical issues shortly before 1 p.m. Eastern time on Thursday, communicating ongoing updates via its Microsoft 365 Status account on X. In a Friday update at 11:40 a.m. EST, the company confirmed that the underlying technical glitch had been resolved and that work was underway to fully restore services. Officials emphasized that the problem stemmed from an internal technical issue rather than any cyberattack or malicious activity, committing to issue a comprehensive incident report once an internal review concludes.
Data from technology tracking site Downdetector showed more than 130,000 user disruption reports on Thursday, though report counts began to drop by Friday morning. While the total number of affected individuals remains unverified, Microsoft’s website notes that over 430 million people rely on Microsoft 365 applications, spanning individual consumers, students, families, and enterprise clients. The multi-hour email outage stalled routine corporate workflow, with one affected worker remarking that "it's just challenging sending reports or things that needed to be approved," while some social media users shared lighthearted videos celebrating a temporary reprieve from workplace emails.
The disruption radiated through the broader tech and business landscape, as artificial intelligence developers OpenAI and Anthropic both reported connectivity problems linking to Microsoft 365 software tools. In the industrial sector, U.S.-based technology firm Workhorse Group Inc. was forced to postpone its quarterly financial earnings conference call as a direct result of the outage.
In Australia, Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke revealed on Friday that Microsoft officials had compared the incident to the massive 2024 CrowdStrike disruption. Speaking to reporters in Sydney after consultations with Microsoft's top Australian executive and the national cybersecurity coordinator, Burke noted: "They don't believe they are dealing with a cyberattack. They believe that they are dealing in some ways (with something) similar to what we saw with respect to CrowdStrike where there is an update that has gone awry." Texas-based cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike caused a global tech shutdown in July 2024 when a flawed software update pushed bad data to millions of computers, disrupting flights, banking, broadcasting, and hospital operations.
Global businesses and airlines also reported operational friction. Danny Lau, a Hong Kong businessperson running an aluminum firm, stated that his company's Outlook accounts failed to receive communications from U.S. clients, warning that prolonged downtime could "impact the production timeline." In India, Air India maintained normal flight operations while temporarily rerouting its email systems to preserve customer communication. Indian carrier IndiGo reported that email support disruptions temporarily hampered customer query intake, though flights remained unaffected and alternate support channels operated normally.
Government institutions across several nations faced administrative setbacks. Singapore's Government Technology Agency confirmed that official government email services had gone down and were being repaired in coordination with Microsoft. The Supreme Court of the Philippines announced on social media that the Microsoft 365 service disruption had impaired some court operations, including automated and routine email responses. Meanwhile, in Japan, Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Masanao Ozaki confirmed that the outage affected national government IT infrastructure, adding that officials were "keeping a close eye on the developments."
Reactions from industry analysts highlighted potential long-term accountability questions for Microsoft. Dan Ives, a technology analyst at Yorkville Ives and Co., posted on X on Friday: "Microsoft in a Friday the 13th moment as global outage [causes] a very bad day in Redmond. There will be major questions for MSFT in this global outage."
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Md. Kazi Bijoy is a dedicated tech enthusiast and content creator with a passion for digital innovation. With years of experience in the tech industry, he specializes in breaking down complex topics into easy-to-understand guides. When he isn’t writing, he explores the latest gadgets and researches emerging trends in the digital world.