Instagram and Facebook are down in the US, UK, and parts of Europe and Asia, with social media users saying the apps are not working properly.
Over 1,000 people have reported issues including with sending and receiving messages on Messenger. While some users have said they can send messages, recipients are not able to reply – and some people said they are being shown as “unavailable to friends”.
Some also complained they cannot see stories or conduct searches on both apps. Others reported problems in the comments section and the news feed of Instagram.
READ MORE: Facebook and Instagram down: Users hit by ‘session expired’ bug blocking access
DownDetector, a site monitoring problems online, including with social media apps, noted a spike in reports related to Instagram and Facebook today. During the outage, many headed to X, formerly called Twitter, to complain.
Someone wrote: “Facebook down again.” Another added on X: “Chill guys Facebook is down again.” One said: “Ugh SERIOUSLY?! AGAIN!!!no wonder my videos dont wanna play!”
Another user wrote: “My notifications gone.” A person wrote on X: “Since Facebook and Instagram are currently down, I will just stay here for the meantime.”
Someone complained: “why instagram always wanna be down when i wanna get on it.” One added: “Is facebook really down again ? Or is it just me ?”
One expressed frustration writing: “Why is Instagram & Facebook down?!? They got all this money and they can’t fix their servers?” A map shared by DownDetector shows several reports in the US including in Los Angeles, Phoenix, Boston, Chicago, Houston, and Seattle.
The latest outage comes just two weeks after the social media apps went down for users globally. Following reports of users experiencing issues on March 5, Meta’s Communications Director Andy Stone shared on X (formerly Twitter): “We’re aware people are having trouble accessing our services. We are working on this now.”
One of the first users to post said: “Facebook is Down. Can’t access my account,” whilst another added: “Facebook Down/ Instagram Down everything in Meta down.” Co-founder Mark Zuckerberg has not commented on the recent outages but in 2021, following six hours of downtime, he posted: “Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger are coming back online now. Sorry for the disruption today — I know how much you rely on our services to stay connected with the people you care about.”
In a savage comeback, X owner Elon Musk posted on Tuesday afternoon, writing: “If you are reading this post, it’s because our servers are working.” The last time there was a reported outage of this scale was the 2021 outage, when on October 5, millions were thrown off the platform and were unable to get back on for several hours. All four Meta-owned apps were down for six hours due to issues with the Border Gateway Protocol, which essentially signposts users onto the site.
Meta at the time issued a heartfelt apology, writing: “We’re aware that some people are having trouble accessing our apps and products. We’e working to get things back to normal as quickly as possible, and we apologize for any inconvenience.
“To the huge community of people and businesses around the world who depend on us: we’re sorry. We’ve been working hard to restore access to our apps and services and are happy to report they are coming back online now. Thank you for bearing with us.”
