Xbox's online services have suffered a major outage, leaving many players unable to sign in or play digital, disc-based and backward-compatible games. The disruption comes just a week after a similar outage affected PlayStation Network, reigniting concerns about the reliability of always-online gaming infrastructure and the risks of relying on digital game ownership rather than physical media.

Microsoft's Xbox status page has flagged major outages across account and profile services, the store and subscriptions, games and gaming, and apps and mobile, with users reporting disconnections and an inability to launch titles that require sign-in. The problems were first reported at 11pm EST on Sunday, and while Microsoft says it has identified the cause, a fix is still pending. The timing is notable given Sony's recent announcement that it will stop producing physical game discs, a move that has drawn criticism from PlayStation fans and highlighted how digital licences, unlike owned discs, can be lost if servers go down or publishers withdraw content, as happened recently when Sony removed over 500 films from PlayStation accounts.