Gmail users hit by worldwide outage

Is your email down? You're not the only one. Photo / Unsplash

Gmail users are reportedly experiencing issues worldwide.

Google has said it is currently working to identify and fix the issue but not many details are known about what is actually causing the problem (see the latest updates on the company's service page here).

Users across the world are getting bouncebacks when trying to email Gmail accounts.

Senders report messages telling them the Gmail account does not exist.

DEVELOPING: Google investigating a second major outage affecting Gmail

— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) December 15, 2020

Google says the issue is affecting a "significant subset" of users.

Most users can access their inboxes but may encounter "error messages, high latency, and/or other unexpected behavior," according to an update released by the company on its service status page.

550-5.1.1 The email account that you tried to reach does not exist. - is error returned for accounts that are closed or otherwise do not exist. For this to be returned for valid Gmail accounts creates an extremely problematic situation with a range of possible negative effects.

— Lauren Weinstein (@laurenweinstein) December 15, 2020

The email issues come just a day after Google also experienced an outage to its other services, including YouTube and Google Docs.

In an update, Google says "Gmail service has already been restored for some users". "We expect a resolution for all users in the near future. Please note this time frame is an estimate and may change. The affected users are able to access Gmail, but are seeing error messages, high latency, and/or other unexpected behaviour," the company added.