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McDonald's is active in 120 countries, servicing almost 70 million people on any given day. Whether they're going for the happy meals, hot chocolate, smoothies, or other options on the menu, it's clear that McDonald's has quite the fanbase. Food and drinks are quickly made and easy to consume, even while on the move.

It goes without saying that the fast food restaurant largely relies upon technology for day-to-day operations. Ringing up orders, giving customers change, and letting the kitchen know which foods need to be prepared are all made possible by modern tech.

Earlier today, however, McDonald's ran into issues that led to numerous restaurant closures for hours at a time.

What happened to McDonald's?

Tech outages temporarily blocked the fast food restaurant from being able to process credit card payments, get information from self-serve kiosks, and more. Some customers even reported ongoing issues with their McDonald's apps.

Amid the chaos, the restaurant stated trouble with one of its technology suppliers caused the aforementioned problems. While some locations around the world shut down for hours, others stayed open, but could only accept orders paid for in cash.

McDonald's employees, rather than entering orders in machines, had to manually write them down and then inform the kitchen staff what to prepare.

After some time, the fast food establishment managed to restore operations and return to business as usual. Locations from everywhere to Australia, the United Kingdom, Japan, and beyond felt the impacts of these temporary tech outages.

Customers react on social media

Tech problems impacting McDonald's on an international scale made for plenty of talk on social media this Friday. Users took to X, drawing attention to the situation and questioning the underlying cause. On YouTube, content creators and news channels have also reported on the developments.

Some customers wondered if the fast food company was internally hacked, while others suggested it shouldn't rely on one singular system to process orders. Many McDonald's customers also felt flabbergasted that an issue like this could affect locations across different continents.

As the systems returned to normal, various locations gradually started taking orders again. McDonald's eventually apologized to customers adversely impacted by these disruptions.