MICROSOFT has fully restored its services following a massive global outage that disrupted its Microsoft 365 applications, including Outlook, Teams and its artificial intelligence assistant Copilot, for several hours.
AP reported the technology giant saying on Saturday that it had resolved the underlying technical issue and restored services to all affected customers and regions.
"We have completed our efforts to address the underlying issue of the incident and restored service to the remaining impacted customers and regions," the company said in an update on X.
The outage, which began around midday on Thursday in the United States, generated disruption reports from users in more than 70 countries and territories, according to online monitoring platform Downdetector.
Governments, courts, healthcare providers, businesses, airlines and banks were among those affected, with Japan, Singapore and Australia among the countries reporting operational disruptions.
Microsoft apologised for the disruption on Friday, stressing that the incident was not related to a cyberattack or artificial intelligence agents.
The company attributed the outage to an issue arising during an earlier network capacity upgrade, which surfaced following a subsequent network change.
It said the recovery process involved restoring services gradually after technical problems affected parts of its infrastructure.
The disruption highlighted the risks of widespread dependence on a single technology provider for essential communications and business operations.
Jeremy Singer, a professor at the University of Glasgow's School of Computing Science, said the outage had left many office workers effectively unable to work.
"With no emails coming or going, many office workers feel like they are having a virtual snow day," he said.
However, he warned that the incident also raised questions about the resilience of digital infrastructure.
"This problem serves to emphasise the dependence we have built on one company's digital infrastructure, and may lead us to question whether we need more resilience in our IT ecosystem," he added.
Microsoft 365 has more than 430 million users, according to the company's website, while Microsoft said in January it had more than 450 million paid commercial subscriptions to its services.
The outage's impact extended beyond office communications, disrupting essential public services in several countries.
In Britain, a trial in Manchester was halted after technical difficulties prompted Judge Maurice Greene to send jurors home.
British police also reported difficulties receiving crime reports online, while the National Pharmacy Association warned of delays in medication services after disruptions affected the National Health Service.
Some healthcare providers faced difficulties emailing prescriptions to pharmacies, potentially delaying patients' access to medication.
In the United States, the sheriff's office in Arapahoe County, Colorado, reported disruptions to online bond payments.
Several government agencies in Singapore, Japan, Greece and Norway also reported interruptions to email communications and other operations.
Businesses were similarly affected, including companies in Hong Kong that experienced difficulties communicating with overseas customers and disruptions to some banking services.
OpenAI and Anthropic also reported problems connecting with Microsoft 365 tools, highlighting the wider implications of disruptions to technology platforms increasingly integrated with artificial intelligence services. - November 14, 2026
