According to DownDetector, external the problem began just before midnight on Friday night, with more than 71,000 users reporting the outage to the site.

Some gamers on social media say they are still experiencing issues, with PlayStation’s support social media channels flooded with complaints from around the world.

Jeff Thigpen, 48, from Dallas in the United States, said he had been unable to access the PSN for 10 hours.

“At my job I have an hourly rotation and during my break I’ll occasionally get on my PlayStation Portal,” he told the BBC.

“Tonight I tried and was unable to play any of the games I purchased.

“Paying a monthly fee for their service is one thing but not being able to play games that we’ve purchased is something that’s beyond frustrating.”

The outage means that players of Call of Duty are unable to participate in its promotional weekend, which offered double XP in Black Ops 6 and Warzone.

BBC News has approached both PlayStation and Call of Duty developer Activision Blizzard for comment.