Facebook down: Instagram and WhatsApp all stop working in major outage
How long will Facebook be down? Company says it is aware of issue – but not why it has broken or when it will come back online
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook have all gone down in a major outage.
The three apps – which are owned by Facebook and run on shared infrastructure – all completely stopped working shortly before 5pm (12pm EST). Other products that are part of the same family of apps, such as Facebook Workplace, also stopped working.
Visitors to the Facebook website simply saw an error page or a message that their browser could not connect. The WhatsApp and Instagram apps continued to work, but did not show new content, including any messages sent or received during the problems.
:: Read our live coverage of the outage here ::
Facebook’s outages happen relatively rarely but tend to be vast in their impact, not least because they affect three of the world’s biggest apps.
The company is often cryptic about the causes of any issues, and does not tend to explain them even after they are fixed. In 2019, for instance, it suffered its biggest outage in years – and said only that it had “triggered an issue” during “routine maintenance operations”.
In a leaked transcript published in The Verge in 2019, chief executive Mark Zuckerberg noted that such outages are a “big deal”. Any problems can often lead people to start using competitors instead, he said, and noted that it can take “months” to win back trust and get people back on Facebook’s platforms – if they come back at all.
To sign up to our breaking email alerts click here
A company spokesperson said that it apologised for the problem but gave no indication of why the outage began or how long it might take to fix.
“We’re aware that some people are having trouble accessing our apps and products,” spokesperson Andy Stone said on Twitter. “We’re working to get things back to normal as quickly as possible, and we apologize for any inconvenience.”
The same statement was posted shortly after on the official Facebook Twitter page.
Instagram also shared a similar update.
“Instagram and friends are having a little bit of a hard time right now, and you may be having issues using them,” it wrote on its communications page. “Bear with us, we’re on it!”
And WhatsApp also updated users through its official Twitter account.
“We’re aware that some people are experiencing issues with WhatsApp at the moment. We’re working to get things back to normal and will send an update here as soon as possible,” it said.
“Thanks for your patience!”
Facebook’s shares had already plunged sharply as trading began on Monday, probably because of other ongoing criticism in the wake of allegations shared by a whistleblower who previously worked at the company.
The fall continued after the outage began, however, with the price dropping even more.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments