On December 11, 2024, a series of outages significantly impacted several of Meta’s popular applications, including Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger. The issues began around 1 PM ET, leaving many users frustrated as they experienced difficulties accessing their feeds or encountered older posts instead of up-to-date content. Staff members at The Verge reported firsthand their challenges with these apps, echoing a widespread concern among Meta’s user base.
Downdetector, a platform that tracks service interruptions, registered alarming spikes in user reports during the outage. At the height of the incident, over 66,000 users flagged issues with Instagram while Facebook saw even larger numbers, with reports exceeding 83,000. Such a surge indicated that a vast portion of the user community was unable to access their favorite social networking sites.
Meta took to X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, to acknowledge the situation shortly before 2 PM ET. However, after several hours of interruption, the company reported progress in resolving the issues. By 5:26 PM ET, Meta announced that they were nearly finished addressing the problems, stating, “Thanks for bearing with us! We’re 99% of the way there — just doing some last checks. We apologize to those who’ve been affected by the outage.”
Less than an hour later, at 6:02 PM ET, Instagram confirmed that they had restored services. Their message read, “Andddd we’re back — sorry for the wait, and thanks for bearing with us.” This sudden return to normalcy offered a sigh of relief to users who rely on these apps for personal and professional communication.
Notably, this outage comes on the heels of previous disruptions affecting Meta’s properties; a similar event took place in March 2024, which hindered access to Facebook, Instagram, and Threads for users. Meta also experienced major outages in October 2022, raising concerns about the reliability of their platforms. Such repeated incidents prompt discussions about the infrastructure underpinning these services and the measures needed to prevent future occurrences.
As of the latest updates, Meta has clarified that they have resolved the majority of the issues but did not elaborate on the specific cause of these outages.
