A Facebook Instagram outage triggered thousands of problem reports across the US before both Meta-owned platforms largely recovered within about an hour. The cause remains unclear.
WASHINGTON: Facebook and Instagram are back online after a brief disruption triggered thousands of outage reports in the United States, temporarily leaving users struggling to access two of the world’s biggest social media platforms.
The Facebook-Instagram outage began at around 8.55pm ET on Sunday, September 20, with reports rapidly climbing on outage-monitoring service Downdetector. At the peak, Facebook recorded more than 17,000 problem reports, while Instagram received more than 5,000.
How long were Facebook and Instagram down?
The disruption appears to have been relatively brief. By around 10pm ET, the volume of outage reports had fallen sharply, indicating that Facebook and Instagram had largely recovered.
Users reported difficulties accessing the platforms and using some services. More than half of the Downdetector complaints for both Facebook and Instagram involved problems with their websites.
Importantly, Downdetector’s figures represent user-submitted reports rather than a confirmed total of people affected. The actual scale of the disruption could therefore have been higher or lower than the numbers recorded by the service.
Were users outside the US affected?
While the biggest spike in reports was recorded in the United States, users in other markets also reported problems.
In Singapore, for example, Facebook reports peaked at 229 at around 9.26am local time on September 21, while Instagram reached 109 reports around the same period. Reports also emerged from users in several other countries.
Facebook Messenger also experienced an increase in reported problems during the disruption, while WhatsApp recorded a smaller rise in complaints.
What caused the Meta outage?
The cause of the Facebook Instagram outage remains unclear. Meta had not provided an explanation for the disruption at the time of reporting, while Reuters said the company did not immediately respond to its request for comment.
The incident follows another disruption in July, when Downdetector recorded peaks of 4,808 problem reports for Facebook and 2,829 for Instagram.
Are Facebook and Instagram working again?
The sharp fall in problem reports indicates that both services have largely returned to normal following Sunday’s disruption.
The latest Facebook Instagram outage was short-lived, but the rapid surge in reports once again showed how quickly service interruptions affecting major social platforms can be noticed across multiple markets.
Impact to expect
The disruption is unlikely to have a lasting impact if services remain stable. However, even brief outages can interrupt communication, advertising and businesses that depend on Meta’s platforms to reach customers, particularly when multiple services experience problems simultaneously.
