Facebook and Instagram were both down, affecting users across the globe
The issue seemed to be global.
Facebook and Instagram suffered massive outages, which left potentially millions of users unable to access the popular social media platforms.
The issue appeared to be global.
Threads, Instagram’s rival platform to X, and Facebook Messenger also suffered issues. WhatsApp, also owned by Meta, appeared to briefly suffer a small outage, affecting hundreds of users.
Within half an hour of the issues first appearing on Down Detector, at around 3pm, the number of reports had passed 90,000 for Facebook, and 15,000 for Instagram. At its peak, more than 250,000 UK Facebook users reported issues, while in the US more than half a million users reported the outage.
On Down Detector, 40% of reports cited login issues, after users could not load the apps or websites as normal. Facebook users found they were logged out whilst Instagram refused to work at all.
The error messages seem to be the result with the platform’s login system, rather than the sites being hacked or under a cyber attack.
On Facebook the outage appeared to affect all platforms, but 89% of reports regarding Instagram highlighted the app – but it has far fewer desktop users than Facebook.
Third-party apps hosted by Meta also appeared to be having issues.
Many users took to X, formerly Twitter, to complain about the problem – and as is often the case, were concerned they had been hacked.
Ann Autumn wrote: ‘My hands are shaking so much right now I can barely type. And my heart is pounding. I couldn’t get into Facebook and I was sure that my account was hacked. But Twitter peeps are confirming the #facebookdown situation. #instagramdown as well. So relieved that it’s not just me.’
Kaye wrote: ‘Is Meta down or am I being hacked? My Instagram isn’t loading and my Facebook is also “session logged out”.’
Maham Khattak, based in Australia, wrote: ‘Anyone else’s #Facebook logged out? Can’t log back in, keeps saying session expired or unexpected error?’
Users in the US, Brazil, India and Guatemala were among those who reported issues on X. #instagram down was trending.
Meta posted on its corporate X account that they were aware of the issues and will work on them. The Facebook or Instagram X accounts has not yet addressed the outages.
Facebook has 2 billion daily active users, Instagram has around 500 million.
Both of the Meta-owned sites have suffered serious outages in recent weeks, but never at the same time.
Metro.co.uk has contacted Meta for comment.