Global Microsoft System Outage Eases as Fixes Roll Out Worldwide

UPDATE - follow-up to Microsoft outage eases after over a day, recovery timeline uncertain: Microsoft reported that a wider rollout of software fixes was stabilizing its systems and easing a global outage that disrupted online communications for businesses and governments for more than 24 hours.

Details of the Incident

Server issues caused the disruption, which affected Microsoft Outlook, Teams, Copilot, and several Microsoft 365 applications starting Thursday, November 13, 2026. The incident specifically hit features tied to Exchange Online, while unconnected applications remained operational. Ookla's Downdetector logged over 7.4 million reports worldwide, with complaints peaking at nearly 20,000 a minute. Microsoft stated it was not aware of any malicious activity and ruled out artificial intelligence as the cause.

Global Impact

The disruption affected government agencies, trading firms, airlines, and healthcare services across Australia, Japan, the United States, and the United Kingdom. In the UK, the NHS and London's Metropolitan Police faced email issues, prompting the police to use alternative ways to report crimes online while emergency call responses remained unaffected. Organizations in Taiwan, Switzerland, and the US delayed financial reports or resorted to alternative methods like fax for trades. Cloud-hosted organizations bore the brunt, while those hosting services on their own servers were somewhat spared.

Market and Insurance Reactions

Microsoft shares closed flat at $523.88 on Friday. Mario De Cicco, vice president of European financial institutions at Morningstar DBRS, estimated global insured losses between $300 million and $500 million, noting this is well below the $400 million to $1.5 billion toll from the 2024 CrowdStrike outage. Luke Kehoe, lead industry analyst at Ookla, highlighted how much of the workday runs through a single provider. Meanwhile, Josh Gilbert, a market analyst at eToro, warned that repeated reliability issues give IT departments reasons to reconsider relying on one provider.

Context

Major technology platforms act as central digital infrastructure for thousands of global enterprises, meaning that sudden server-side glitches can ripple instantly across international borders. Companies increasingly depend on cloud services for daily operations, communication, and financial transactions, raising long-term questions about technological concentration and risk management across modern industries.