Microsoft’s Outlook, Teams and Copilot services remained disrupted on Friday, as a widespread outage affecting its Microsoft 365 platform stretched beyond 12 hours, disrupting business communications, government operations and financial activities across several countries.
According to a report by Reuters, the disruption, which Microsoft attributed to server-related problems, affected organisations in Australia, Japan, the United States and parts of Europe and Asia, forcing some businesses to rely on alternative communication channels to maintain operations.
Microsoft said it had not identified any malicious activity behind the incident, adding that its engineers had implemented fixes across a wider part of its infrastructure to restore services.
In its latest service update on Friday, the company said it was observing signs of stabilisation, although a full and sustained recovery had yet to be confirmed.
The outage affected features of Microsoft 365 that depend on Exchange Online, the company’s cloud-based email and messaging platform responsible for delivering emails, calendars, contacts and tasks. Services and features that do not rely on Exchange Online continued to function.
The disruption had consequences beyond routine email communication, affecting financial transactions, corporate reporting schedules and customer support operations.
In Taiwan, the outage disrupted fund management activities at securities firms, life insurers and investment trust companies. One financial institution reportedly cancelled a bond repurchase transaction, while another resorted to using fax machines to confirm trades, according to sources cited by Reuters.
In Europe, Euronext, a major stock exchange operator, said its listing teams were experiencing email communication difficulties, while British insurer Aviva activated contingency arrangements ahead of its earnings calls. Danish shipping company Maersk also warned customers of delays to email responses and service updates.
The disruption extended to the aviation industry, with Indian airlines IndiGo, Akasa Air and Air India reporting problems with their email support services.
US electric truck manufacturer Workhorse Group postponed its financial results announcement, originally scheduled for Thursday, to November 16, while Swiss luxury goods group Richemont briefly delayed the publication of its first-half results on Friday.
Technology companies were also affected, with OpenAI and Anthropic reporting problems involving their Microsoft connectors.
Government institutions were not spared. Australia’s intelligence agency and federal police were among the public institutions affected, while the US House of Representatives said the incident had disrupted access for some of its users, with its technical teams working alongside Microsoft to address the problem.
The incident represents another major disruption to Microsoft’s productivity services in recent months, raising questions about the reliability of cloud-based platforms that have become central to the daily operations of businesses and public institutions.
Microsoft experienced another Microsoft 365 outage in January 2026, while disruptions in October 2025 and an Azure cloud service incident later that month also affected access to its productivity software and other digital services.
Josh Gilbert, a market analyst at trading platform eToro, said recurring reliability concerns could encourage corporate IT departments to reconsider concentrating more of their operations within Microsoft’s ecosystem, potentially creating opportunities for competing cloud and productivity service providers.
