Workday outage disrupts HR and payroll for 11,500 global clients after backup testing error
Workday, a major human resources and payroll platform, experienced a significant service interruption on Friday, November 13, 2026. The outage affected approximately 11,500 organizations worldwide, including major corporations and government agencies. Employees were unable to access accounts, clock in, or process benefits. The company attributed the issue to a problem discovered during backup system testing, which required placing systems into maintenance mode. This incident occurred shortly after a major Microsoft outage earlier in the week.