McDonald’s says it has resolved the technical issue that has prevented customers from around the world being unable to order food.

Outlets across the UK, Ireland, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Germany and Austria were all experiencing technical problems on Friday morning (15 March).

The website Downdetector also reported a spike in problems with the McDonald’s app beginning around 6am.

The official McDonald’s New Zealand posted on X: “Our sincerest apologies for the inconvenience caused by the recent outage affecting McDonald’s stores in New Zealand, Australia, and Japan. Rest assured, we are working diligently to address and resolve the issue promptly. Thank you for your understanding.

McDonald’s in Japan posted on X that “operations are temporarily out at many of our stores nationwide“, describing it as “a system failure”.

And in Germany, one customer posted a photograph of a handwritten sign from a McDonald’s outlet stating that the branch was closed. “McDonald’s Germany is down. It seems [to be] in Austria too,” they added.

Customer responses to the news on social media were mixed, with some reporting problems at their local branch or with the McDonald’s app.

“Hmmm @McDonaldsUK my local is turning everyone away saying there’s a national outage on your ordering system?”, wrote one person in Birmingham.

Others were split between calling for a boycott of the chain, due to its perceived support of Israel, and those mystified that the outage was considered breaking news.

“Sending my thoughts and prayers to everyone affected by the devastating news surrounding McDonalds this morning,” wrote one user on X.

“All the [shamrock emoji] shake demand is disabling @McDonalds systems,” wrote another person, referencing the fast food chain’s Shamrock Shake, a seasonal milkshake introduced in the US to mark St Patrick’s Day.

“All McDonald’s restaurants are connected to a global network and that is what’s messed up,” Patrik Hjelte, owner of several McDonald’s restaurants in central Sweden, near the Norwegian border, told local newspaper Nya Wermlands Tidning. “Right now we are restarting all systems and we hope to be up and running again as usual soon.”

By 11.10am, however, McDonald’s stated that the matter had been resolved throughout the UK and Ireland.

“We are aware of a technology outage which impacted our restaurants.

“The issue has now been resolved in the UK and Ireland. We thank customers for their patience and apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused. The issue is not related to a cybersecurity event.”

Are McDonald’s restaurants open again?

According to the most recent statement from McDonald’s, the situation has been “resolved”, which suggests that restaurants have returned to normal service.

i has contacted McDonald’s seeking further confirmation.

Can I order McDonald’s takeaway?

As stated above, the official statement from McDonald’s stating that the technical problems it was experiencing have been resolved in the UK and Ireland suggests that customers can now order a takeaway, although there may be a delay in systems returning to normal.