Early Sunday morning, Facebook users encountered difficulties accessing the platform. The website displayed a message indicating accounts were “temporarily unavailable.” According to Downdetector, a website that tracks service outages, the problems surfaced around 3:25 a.m. ET. Thousands in the U.S. reported trouble accessing Facebook. Issues also appeared on Instagram, both platforms owned by Meta.
A message on Facebook stated: “Your account is currently unavailable due to a site issue. We expect this to be resolved shortly. Please try again in a few minutes.” Similar problems cropped up in Canada, Mexico, India, the U.K., and parts of Europe.
Some users noted a pattern: Facebook worked on mobile devices but not on desktop browsers. Downdetector reported 63% of complaints about website access, 20% related to mobile issues, and 10% concerning the app.
One Reddit user shared they initially received a “You’ve been temporarily banned” message before being redirected to a generic error page. Another user mentioned a temporary block message for “going too fast and overusing.” They indicated the actions involved refreshing the page to check if the platform was operational. Others reported similar experiences.
Reports of Instagram issues have also increased, according to Downdetector. The site cites 44% of complaints about the feed or timeline, 40% involving the app, and 12% concerning posting content. Users faced challenges loading feeds, sending messages, and viewing stories, with some receiving error messages and encountering server connection problems.
Additionally, Downdetector shows reports of issues with WhatsApp, with 44% related to messaging, 39% to the app, and 8% to login problems. However, these reports are fewer compared to those for Facebook, indicating less extensive disruption to WhatsApp services.
Meta has faced several significant service disruptions in recent times. In October 2021, a nearly six-hour global outage affected Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger. The company attributed the incident to a faulty change in network infrastructure configuration, which unintentionally severed communication between data centers.
More recently, in March 2024, Facebook, Instagram, and to a lesser degree, Threads and WhatsApp experienced an outage affecting access for hundreds of thousands. Users were unexpectedly logged out and couldn’t sign back in. Instagram feeds did not refresh during this period. Meta cited a technical issue for the disruption without detailing the specific cause.
The current issues involve Facebook (including Messenger), Instagram, and WhatsApp. There are no similar reports for Threads or other Meta platforms like Meta Quest.
Christine Harrison, a digital designer, mentioned that analysts suspect the outage arose from a problem during a major system update. An analyst confirmed that “notified some regions about a planned update earlier this morning,” suggesting a glitch during the update might have caused the access issues. Meta has yet to confirm the source of the disruptions.
Newsweek has reached out to Meta by email regarding awareness of the issues across Facebook and Instagram, identification of the cause, and an estimated resolution timeline.
Contact Newsweek editors Tobias Meyjes and Tony Phillips for further updates on this ongoing story.