Microsoft tests a fix after servers fail automated health checks
A widespread outage disrupted Microsoft platforms including Outlook on Thursday, leaving many users unable to use their email accounts and touching off errors across the tech giant’s suite of apps.
The outage tracker Downdetector logged nearly 130,000 reports of problems accessing Outlook just after 1 p.m. ET. New reports have since fallen from that peak, but many users said they could not send and receive emails or had trouble loading their inboxes altogether.
Thousands of users also reported issues with Microsoft’s workplace messaging app Teams, as well as its AI assistant Copilot and the company’s wider Microsoft 365 services.
Microsoft said it was investigating the disruptions, notably related to its email and Teams applications. In updates posted on social media, the Redmond, Washington-based company said it was aware of users “experiencing issues accessing Exchange Online mailboxes through multiple connection methods in the Americas.”
Microsoft said a portion of its infrastructure was “experiencing elevated load,” which it said was “likely contributing to the connectivity errors.” The company said it determined that a number of servers were “unexpectedly unavailable” because of a problem that caused them to fail during “automated health checks.”
The exact cause of the failure was not immediately clear. Microsoft later said it was testing a fix and rolling out an alternative method for the checks to bring impacted servers back online.
“We’re aggressively pursuing all pathways to reduce impact,” the Microsoft 365 Status account wrote on X.
Earlier in the day, Microsoft said it had “successfully restored” problems related to Teams in North America, although some users continued to report connectivity issues.