Microsoft outage disrupts Outlook email and AI assistants globally

A global Microsoft Outlook outage on Thursday, November 12, prevented tens of thousands of users from accessing their email, with Microsoft confirming the issue could affect Microsoft 365 connections worldwide. Microsoft said it was working "relentlessly" to resolve the problem, pausing deployments, offloading affected infrastructure, and restarting servers. Downdetector reported nearly 130,000 user complaints shortly after 7 PM Paris time, with about 50,000 still reporting issues three hours later. The outage also disrupted AI assistants like Microsoft's Copilot, Claude, and ChatGPT, which rely on Microsoft accounts for email and calendar access. Public services were impacted, including the University of Iowa hospital network, which asked patients to use its online portal to contact caregivers.