Last updated: Friday, November 13, 2026 – morning (Central Time)
If you’ve had trouble opening Outlook, sending email, or joining a Teams call since Thursday afternoon, you’re not alone, and it’s not something on your end. Microsoft is working through a large, worldwide Microsoft 365 outage that began Thursday, November 12. Our team at ThrottleNet has been tracking it since the first reports came in, and we want you to have a clear, plain-English picture of what’s going on.
Here’s what we’re doing about it, what happened, what’s affected, where things stand this morning, and how to reach us while email is unreliable.
What ThrottleNet is doing
We’re on it. Our team is:
- Watching Microsoft’s service health updates around the clock, including the official incident reports in the Microsoft 365 admin center (incident IDs EX1550543 and MO1550821).
- Checking in on client environments as service comes back, so we can spot anything that needs attention once mail starts flowing normally.
- Ready to help you work around problems. If something critical is stuck, call us and we’ll help you find another way to get it done today.
We’ll post updates here and on our social channels as new information comes in, and we’ll follow up once Microsoft confirms service is fully back to normal.
What happened
The trouble started around noon Central Time on Thursday, November 12. Within hours, organizations in more than 70 countries were reporting problems, including businesses, airlines, hospitals and government offices.
At the center of it is Exchange Online, the Microsoft service that runs Outlook email for most businesses. Because so many other Microsoft 365 tools depend on Exchange Online, the problem spread to Teams, Copilot, SharePoint and more.
Why it happened
Microsoft hasn’t published a final root cause yet, but here’s what it has shared so far:
- Servers went offline unexpectedly. A large number of Microsoft’s email servers stopped handling requests. Microsoft says a process that sets up secure connections on those servers became overwhelmed, and the servers began failing their automated health checks.
- The remaining servers got overloaded. The servers still running had to absorb the extra traffic and started struggling too. Some servers Microsoft brought back online failed again once traffic hit them, which is why recovery has been slow.
- A recent configuration change lines up with the start of the problem. Microsoft is rolling back a recent network configuration change that coincided with the outage. It has not yet confirmed that change as the cause, and it has paused other changes while it investigates.
This was not a cyberattack. Microsoft has said there is no indication of malicious or cyber activity, and there are no reports of compromised data. Your accounts and information are not at risk because of this outage.
What’s affected
- Outlook / Exchange Online email is hit hardest. Some users can’t open their mailboxes on the web, desktop or mobile apps, and some emails are arriving late.
- Calendars, Teams and Copilot may also have problems because they rely on Exchange Online.
- SharePoint and OneDrive: some users have reported issues. Files have generally remained accessible, but email-related features like sharing notifications may be affected.
- Other apps connected to your Microsoft 365 email or calendar (scheduling tools, CRMs, scanners that send to email, etc.) may also be affected.
One important note: this is a Microsoft-side problem. Restarting your computer, reinstalling Outlook or resetting your password won’t fix it, so there’s no need to spend time troubleshooting your own devices.
Current status (as of Friday morning, November 13)
- Things are getting better, especially here in North America. Microsoft reports continued recovery progress, with broader improvements in North America and steady progress in Europe and Asia. Many users are seeing Outlook come back this morning.
- You may still see hiccups. Some users may still have intermittent issues while Microsoft finishes recovery and works through the backlog of queued email.
- Delayed email should still arrive. Microsoft extended its email delivery window to 48 hours to help protect delayed messages. Most of those emails should still come through, so there’s no need to resend everything. For anything time-sensitive, a quick phone call to confirm is the safest bet.
- No final all-clear yet. Microsoft hasn’t declared full restoration, and it has said it will publish a full post-incident report once things are resolved.
Check Microsoft’s status yourself
Microsoft is posting live updates on its public status page: status.cloud.microsoft
How to reach us while email is unreliable
Email may be slow or unavailable, so please use these channels if you need us:
- Call ThrottleNet Client Support: 866-829-5557
- Support Center: throttlenet.com/support-center
Follow us for the latest updates:
- Facebook: facebook.com/ThrottleNet
- X (Twitter): @throttlenet
- LinkedIn: ThrottleNet, Inc.
- YouTube: ThrottleNet
Thank you for your patience
Outages like this are frustrating, especially when they hit in the middle of a workday. The good news is that Microsoft’s services are coming back this morning, and we’re keeping a close eye on things until everything is fully restored. If something is critical to your business today, don’t wait. Give us a call and we’ll help you work around it.
— The ThrottleNet Team
