Having issues with Microsoft Copilot? Here’s what’s going on
AI-summarised brief · reviewed before publication
Microsoft confirmed on September 17, 2026 that its Copilot AI assistant suffered a service degradation, causing users to receive error messages such as “I’m sorry, I’m having trouble responding to requests right now.” The issue stemmed from problems with a specific API endpoint, prompting the company to launch an investigation and post updates on its status page. By 5:21 PM ET the same day, Microsoft announced that Copilot had returned to full operational readiness. The outage affected anyone relying on Copilot for tasks across Windows, Office and other integrated platforms, temporarily halting the assistant’s ability to generate responses. The incident underscores the dependency of many productivity workflows on the AI service.
💡 Why It Matters
- · A brief Copilot outage reveals how tightly modern work processes now hinge on a single AI service, exposing vulnerability when that service falters.