Xbox Live is DOWN: Major outage blocks thousands of players from accessing online gaming profiles

Xbox Live has been hit by a major outage, leaving thousands of players unable to sign-into their profiles.

DownDetector, a site that monitors outages, shows issues stuck around 1pm ET and are plaguing users in the US, the UK and parts of Europe, Asia and South America.

Users have cited problems with logging in, server connection and game play.

Social media is ablaze with reaction to the sudden crash, with one users sharing on X that they spent all eight hours working hard so they could play video games - only to find Xbox Live is down.

This is a developing story... more updates to come. 

Xbox Support has acknowledged the outage on X, writing: 'We are aware that some users have been disconnected from Xbox Live. We're investigating!' 

DownDetector's issue reports surpassed 38,000 in the US alone, where players in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and other major cities have cited problems.

While the multiplayer online gaming service is down, users can still play video games on their console. 

Xbox Live allows you to access online content - and comes free with the gaming console. 

Even though users can play games they had purchased, many are still frustrated by the issues.

One X user posted: 'Xbox down guess I'll talk to my gf.'