Here's why your Instagram and Facebook feeds are looking bare this morning
Were your Facebook and Instagram feeds looking pretty bare this morning? Fear not, you still have friends. The real reason was actually a massive global outage on Instagram and Facebook which hit the social networks late Thursday.
Per DownDetector, the Facebook outage affected users in the U.S., UK, Mexico and parts of South America, with users reporting that they were unable to access the site for hours. According to TNW, the issue began around 1pm ET (6pm GMT).
Facebook users—including publishers—were unable to post anything to the site during the outage, which might explain why your feed is looking pretty sparse this morning.
And several big publishers in the UK -- like The Guardian, HuffPost and IBTimes UK -- were reporting publishing problems Friday morning, according to IBTimes UK. Many of their scheduled posts aren't going live, and of posts that do make it through, there's no engagement.
Facebook said they are investigating the issue with "highest priority."
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In a statement sent to TNW at 4:42pm ET Thursday, a Facebook spokesperson said the issue had been resolved.
"Earlier today, a technical issue caused some people to have trouble connecting to Facebook and Instagram. We resolved this issue for everyone, and we apologize for any inconvenience," read the statement.
Instagram users took to Twitter around the same time to vent their frustration about Instagram's simultaneous outage.
Some users said they weren't able to post their Instagram stories.
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This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
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So, there you have it. That's why your feeds are looking bare this morning.
Topics Facebook Instagram Social Media
Rachel Thompson is the Features Editor at Mashable. Rachel's second non-fiction book The Love Fix: Reclaiming Intimacy in a Disconnected World is out now, published by Penguin Random House in Jan. 2025. The Love Fix explores why dating feels so hard right now, why we experience difficult emotions in the realm of love, and how we can change our dating culture for the better.
A leading sex and dating writer in the UK, Rachel has written for GQ, The Guardian, The Sunday Times Style, The Telegraph, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, Stylist, ELLE, The i Paper, Refinery29, and many more.
Rachel's first book Rough: How Violence Has Found Its Way Into the Bedroom And What We Can Do About It, a non-fiction investigation into sexual violence was published by Penguin Random House in 2021.
