What’s happening—and how we can help.
Your inbox won’t open. Outlook keeps trying to connect. And somehow you’re still expected to get through a normal working day.
If that sounds familiar, you’re not alone. On the morning of 13 November, widespread reports of Microsoft 365 disruption were still affecting businesses.
Why is Outlook down?
Reporting on the disruption has pointed to elevated load on Microsoft’s infrastructure. The full technical explanation and recovery position are still developing; we are not presenting a confirmed root-cause diagnosis.
Impact can differ between users, applications and Microsoft’s service components. An Outlook connection failure does not necessarily mean every mailbox access method is unavailable. Your administrator should check your tenant’s Microsoft 365 Service health dashboard for the current position.
We’ve built a temporary Outlook workaround
We quickly put together a Windows utility designed to help Outlook find a working connection. In our implementation, it refreshes its list of candidate Microsoft 365 endpoints every 10 minutes, checks reachability and attempts to direct Outlook towards an available endpoint.
It has restored Outlook connectivity in our tests.
A reachable endpoint is not proof that every mailbox operation will work. This is an independent RandTech IT workaround, not a Microsoft-issued patch. It cannot repair Microsoft’s underlying infrastructure, and suitability depends on your Outlook version, company configuration and Microsoft’s service availability.
How do you get it?
Complete the request form above. We’ll review your setup and, where suitable, send the download link and instructions to your secondary email address.
We’ll ask for your affected Microsoft 365 mailbox and domain so we know what needs attention. Your separate, working email address is where we’ll send the link and communications. There is no public download on this page.
If you use a company-managed computer, please get your IT administrator’s approval first. We will never ask for your Microsoft 365 password through this form.
Meanwhile, our SHaiRO clients were still accessing email
During this incident, clients using SHaiRO continued accessing and working with their emails through our system while their Outlook connections were affected.
SHaiRO is our AI assistant for Microsoft 365 email and SharePoint, built to give businesses another way to find and work with their information.
That continued access was an observation from our client environments during this incident. SHaiRO still depends on Microsoft services and granted permissions; it is not immune to Microsoft outages. We have not established why access remained available while those Outlook connections failed.
But it gave those clients another useful way to keep working that morning—and that’s worth a conversation. Select the demo option if you’d like to see SHaiRO in action. Product updates and early-adopter invitations are a separate, optional choice.
Let’s get you moving again
Start with the immediate problem. Tell us what’s affected, leave a working secondary email address, and we’ll help you take the next step.
Incident snapshot: morning of 13 November 2026, SAST. This is not a live status feed. Test results and client observations are reported by RandTech IT. Availability may change as Microsoft restores service.
Sources: eNCA / AFP, 13 November 2026; Microsoft service health guidance. Microsoft and Outlook are Microsoft trademarks. SHaiRO and the workaround are independent RandTech IT offerings.