Facebook experiencing widespread outage on platforms for some users

Meta’s social media platforms, including Instagram, Facebook, and Threads, are experiencing widespread outages on Tuesday morning, affecting users across the globe. Reports of the outage started to surface around 10 a.m. ET, with users encountering issues such as apps not loading or feeds not refreshing. While some Instagram users can still access the app, others are unable to, and many Facebook users are experiencing login issues.

Meta spokesperson Andy Stone acknowledged the problem in a post on the social media site X, stating that they are aware of the difficulties users are facing and are actively working to resolve the issue.

We’re aware people are having trouble accessing our services. We are working on this now.

— Andy Stone (@andymstone) March 5, 2024

The timing of the outages is significant, coinciding with Super Tuesday presidential primaries in 16 states and one territory. This disruption could pose challenges for presidential campaigns that rely heavily on platforms like Facebook and Instagram for voter outreach.

As a result of the outages, hashtags such as “#instagramdown” and “#facebookoutage” are trending on X, indicating widespread awareness of the issue. Additionally, Meta is experiencing disruptions across its Meta Admin Center, Facebook login, WhatsApp Business API, and Marketing API.

This outage follows a major incident in 2021 when Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp were down for more than six hours due to configuration changes on backbone routers. The exact cause of Tuesday’s outages is not immediately clear, and it remains uncertain when services will be fully restored.