Is Microsoft Outlook Down? Thousands Report Email Access Issues in US - Newsweek

Microsoft products are currently down for thousands of users, prompting a surge of complaints on Downdetector.

Reports of issues began around 12:30 p.m. ET on Thursday and have since skyrocketed, according to Downdetector. Microsoft Outlook problem reports peaked at 1:15 p.m. with more than 130,000 reports, and Microsoft 365 issues also prompted thousands of reports, peaking at over 48,000 just after 1:15 p.m. Issues are still being reported. Microsoft said it was looking into the problem.

As of shortly before 3 p.m., there were still more than 26,000 reported issues with Microsoft 365.

During its investigation into the problems, Microsoft 365 Status—which is the official account for updates on certain Microsoft 365 service issues—said that parts of its infrastructure was experiencing "elevated load across multiple regions," which was contributing to connectivity errors. After diving into the issue, it became clear that increased traffic hadn't caused the load problems. Rather, a number of servers were "unexpectedly available," which strained the remaining infrastructure.

"We're testing a configuration change to address a problem that's causing servers to fail automated health checks and become unavailable," Microsoft 365 Status posted on X shortly after 2:30 p.m. ET. "In parallel, we've initiated a restart of all affected servers and are monitoring health as they return to service."

It is still unclear why the servers went offline. There has been no change since the problems began, Microsoft said.

"However, our investigation indicates the failed health checks may originate from a specific component that's responsible for processing server health," Microsoft 365 Status said in its most recent update posted to X shortly before 3:20 p.m. Eastern time. "We've taken steps to prevent additional servers from being impacted while we work to return the affected servers to service."

Outlook is among the most-used email platforms, with around 400 million users. It is commonly used among businesses and government agencies. The Microsoft 365 platform is also widely used and encompasses services such as Teams, Word, Excel, SharePoint, OneDrive, and Copilot, making disruptions potentially far-reaching. In addition to the millions of people who use Microsoft services, the company employs more than 225,000 people, making it one of the largest employers in the United States.

Newsweek emailed Microsoft for comment on Thursday afternoon.

Among the Outlook issues, most users reported problems with the app, accounting for 36 percent of reports. The website was also experiencing problems.

The most recent list of impacted Microsoft 365 services includes: Exchange Online, Microsoft Teams, SharePoint Online, Microsoft Copilot 365, Microsoft Defender XDR, Microsoft Planner and Microsoft To Do. Despite not being listed on the Microsoft update, Outlook users also were reporting issues.

Microsoft said it was looking into what was causing the widespread outages.

“We're investigating reports of users experiencing issues when accessing or using Microsoft Teams functionality in North America,” Microsoft 365 Status posted on X on Thursday morning.

However, a follow-up post said the company had taken action to restore service to Teams. Shortly after, other services began experiencing issues.

Another post said similar issues were being reported with Outlook.

“We're investigating reports of users experiencing issues accessing Exchange Online mailboxes through multiple connection methods in the Americas. More details can be found in the Microsoft 365 admin center under EX1550543,” Microsoft 365 Status said in its most recent post. “While we're working to mitigate impact, we've confirmed the issue may affect Microsoft 365 service connectivity for users in any region.”

Microsoft has provided several updates in the hours since, including the updates about the load surge and connectivity errors. Microsoft tried balancing the load by redistributing traffic across its global infrastructure.

"We're aggressively pursuing all pathways to reduce impact," Microsoft said. "We've paused all deployments, we're moving additional traffic off the affected infrastructure, and we're restarting affected servers to return them to service."

It is unclear when Microsoft service could return, although complaints of products not working properly have started to decrease on Downdetector. An update on the problem was expected by 5 p.m. ET, Microsoft said.

Microsoft was founded in 1975 in Albuquerque, New Mexico, by Bill Gates and Paul Allen. It has since grown into one of the world's largest technology companies.

Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Samantha Beech and Gray R. Thomas