Microsoft 365 went down Monday, with Exchange, Teams and OneDrive affected

On Monday, many Microsoft 365 users got a trip to the waiting room. It started with Exchange Online but quickly spread to Teams, OneDrive, SharePoint, Purview and Defender XDR.

The cause was a fundamental problem with authentication, the part of the system that checks you are who you say you are when you log in.

Microsoft rolled out fixes over the course of the day, and most users saw the services gradually return late Monday evening.

For you as a private or business user: there is nothing to act on right now. The outage appears to have been resolved. If you experienced problems, it was not your setup or your equipment: it was Microsoft's infrastructure acting up.

A good marker: keep an eye on Microsoft's status page if you experience repeated problems in the near future. A one-off outage is rarely cause for concern, but repeated episodes may be worth mentioning to your IT staff.

What it means for you

If you used Microsoft 365 on Monday and had problems with email, Teams or OneDrive, it was not your fault: the error was on Microsoft's side. You do not need to do anything now, since the services are back. If you run into problems again in the near future, it may be worth checking Microsoft's status page or notifying your IT department.