Many businesses are now dealing with backlogs and missed orders that could take days to resolve.
Health services in Britain, Israel and Germany also suffered problems, with some operations cancelled.
The global chaos has sparked concern over the vulnerability of the world’s interconnected technologies, and the extent to which a single software glitch could have such widespread impact.
The issue began at 19:00 GMT on Thursday, affecting Windows users running cybersecurity software CrowdStrike Falcon, according to Microsoft, though the full extent of the problem only became clear by Friday morning.
But by Friday evening, the problems were easing in many parts of the globe, with many airports saying that while there were still issues with check-in and payment systems, most flights were now running.
And the website Downdetector, which detects sites which may be having tech issues, showed fewer sites in the UK which were experiencing problems by the end of the day.
Crowdstrike CEO George Kurtz said on X that a defect was found “in a single content update for Windows hosts”.
“We’re deeply sorry for the impact that we’ve caused to customers, to travellers, to anyone affected by this, including our company,” he told the NBC network.
“Many of the customers are rebooting the system and it’s coming up and it’ll be operational.
“It could be some time for some systems that just automatically won’t recover, but it is our mission… to make sure every customer is fully recovered.”
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