Instagram Outage Disrupts Service For US Users

Instagram Outage Disrupts Service For US Users...

Instagram users across the U.S. reported widespread outages Thursday morning, with many unable to access the app or load content. The disruption began around 9:30 a.m. ET, according to Downdetector, which tracks online service outages.

Meta, Instagram's parent company, acknowledged the issue on its status page but did not immediately provide a cause or estimated resolution time. The outage appears to affect both the mobile app and web version, with users seeing error messages or blank feeds.

Businesses and influencers who rely on Instagram for marketing expressed frustration as scheduled posts failed to publish. "This couldn't have happened at a worse time," said New York-based social media manager Rachel Chen. "We had client campaigns going live this morning."

The outage comes just days after Instagram rolled out new features for Reels and shopping tools. Some users speculated the update might be related to the service disruption, though Meta has not confirmed this.

By 11 a.m. ET, some users reported intermittent access returning, but service remained unstable for many. The hashtag #InstagramDown was trending on X (formerly Twitter) as frustrated users sought updates.

This marks Instagram's second significant outage in 2026, following a similar disruption in January that lasted nearly three hours. The platform has over 150 million monthly active users in the U.S. alone.

Meta's last major outage across its platforms occurred in October 2025, when Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp all went offline for several hours. The company attributed that incident to "configuration changes" in its backbone routers.

As of noon ET, Meta had not provided additional details about today's Instagram issues. The company typically posts updates on its @MetaStatus Twitter account during outages.