The internet experienced a big hiccup on Tuesday morning when Facebook, along with its sister services like Instagram, Messenger, and Threads, went down. This left over half a million people unable to access their accounts, with reports pouring in from frustrated users who were kicked out or couldn’t log back in.
This outage affected not just Facebook but also other platforms owned by its parent company, Meta. Even Meta Quest headsets were affected, kicking users out of their virtual experiences. It wasn’t just Meta platforms either; YouTube also experienced issues around the same time.
People were left wondering, “Is Facebook down?” as they struggled to log in. But it wasn’t just Facebook; Instagram, Messenger, and Threads were also experiencing problems. For a while, it seemed like the whole Metaverse was offline.
Instagram users couldn’t load certain feeds, while Threads wouldn’t display any posts. Messenger users found themselves unexpectedly logged out, unable to send messages to their contacts. YouTube, though not a Meta platform, also had its share of issues during the outage.
Fortunately, by noon, services started coming back online. Meta‘s head of communications acknowledged the problem and assured users that they were working on fixing it. And just in time for discussions about Super Tuesday’s presidential primaries, Facebook and its sister platforms were back up and running.
This outage caused quite a stir on social media, with users flocking to platforms like X to share their frustrations, ask questions, and crack jokes. The hashtag #facebookdown quickly started trending, and even Elon Musk couldn’t resist poking fun at the situation.
Overall, while the outage caused some inconvenience, it serves as a reminder of how dependent we’ve become on these online platforms and how even the biggest of them can experience technical difficulties from time to time.
