Microsoft Teams encountered an outage that caused access issues and multiple problems for some users on Friday.
The problem started at approximately 11 a.m. EST and quickly expanded, as per the outage tracker DownDetector. Users reported trouble accessing the service, delays in sending and receiving messages, and problems displaying graphics.
Microsoft indicated on X (formerly known as Twitter) that they had identified a networking issue affecting a portion of the Teams service and had transferred some services to backup systems. By 1:30 p.m. EST, the company reported completion of the backup transition for Europe, Africa, and the Middle East, with improvements shown in their tracking systems.
Backup switchovers for North and South America were still in progress. While outage reports on DownDetector dropped to nearly half their peak level by 3 p.m. EST, they then stabilized, indicating ongoing issues.
As of September 2023, Teams has over 320 million monthly average users. Despite backup efforts, U.S.-based X users continued to complain about service issues, prompting sarcastic thanks to Microsoft for fixing the problem in regions where the workday had already ended.
In a subsequent tweet, Microsoft acknowledged that the backup switchover did not immediately relieve all end users in North and South America, but they continued to work on mitigation efforts to reduce customer impact.
Microsoft’s public tweets referred users to additional details available in a document posted in an administrative dashboard for Microsoft 365 software. When asked for more information, a Microsoft spokesperson at WE Communications stated that the X posts were the only information they would share.
However, a document obtained by The Associated Press provided a somewhat grim outlook, detailing about a dozen different issues caused by the outage, including login problems, delayed messages, and issues accessing or viewing images, video, audio recordings, and other media.
By 5:02 p.m. EST, Microsoft acknowledged that many customers were still affected by the issue but noted a reduction in errors and an increase in service availability. The company was also addressing specific failures of Teams functions along with broader network efforts.
Reported issues with Teams continued to decline according to DownDetector and were close to normal levels by 7:45 p.m. EST.