Microsoft 365 Outage – What You Need to Know
Last updated: Friday 13 November 2026, 2:00pm
What’s happening?
Since about 6pm on Thursday 12 November, Microsoft has had a major worldwide outage across its Microsoft 365 services. Businesses and organisations around the world are affected, including the UK and the Channel Islands.
Update (Friday 13 November, 2:00pm): Microsoft has applied a further fix and is reporting improved stability, and most people now have access to Outlook and Teams again. Microsoft still hasn’t confirmed that the outage is fully resolved, so a few people may still have problems on and off. Emails held up during the outage should keep arriving over the next day or so. If Outlook still isn’t working for you, close it completely and open it again before calling us.
Update (Friday 13 November, 12:01pm): Microsoft is now restoring service in stages, and many people are getting access to their email again. Some people may still have problems for a while, and Microsoft hasn’t yet confirmed that everything is fixed.
This is a problem inside Microsoft’s own systems. Nothing is wrong with your computer, your network or your account.
Which services are affected?
You may have problems with:
- Outlook and email: you may not be able to open your mailbox, send or receive email, or see your calendar
- Microsoft Teams: chats, meetings and calendar may not work
- SharePoint and OneDrive: you may not be able to open shared files
- Copilot and other Microsoft 365 web apps
- Outlook.com and Hotmail: personal accounts are affected as well
Some people will find things work on and off, or more slowly than usual. Others won’t be able to connect at all.
What should I do?
- Don’t reset your password. Your login is fine, and changing it won’t help. It could cause problems once service comes back.
- Don’t remove or re-add your email account in Outlook or on your phone.
- If Outlook still isn’t working, close it completely and open it again. It may take a while to catch up with emails received during the outage.
- Use the phone for anything urgent. If you’re waiting on an important email, call the person instead.
- Expect some emails to arrive late. Microsoft has extended how long it keeps trying to deliver delayed email to 48 hours, so most messages sent during the outage should still arrive. If something important hasn’t turned up by Monday, ask the sender to send it again.
Can I contact Focused IT?
Yes. Email to and from Microsoft 365 may still be unreliable, so if you’ve emailed us and haven’t heard back, please call us on 01534 780852.
Please only report a problem if it carries on after Microsoft confirms the outage is fixed. Until then we can’t fix it from our end, but we’re watching Microsoft’s updates closely.
When will it be fixed?
Microsoft is bringing its systems back in phases and is seeing recovery across regions, but it hasn’t yet confirmed that the outage is fully over. We’ll update this page when it does.
Is my data safe?
Microsoft says it is not aware of any malicious activity behind this outage. It’s a technical fault, not a cyber-attack, and there’s no indication any data has been lost.