Update: At about 12:15 p.m. PST on Thursday, a Facebook representative told TheWrap the outage issue had been fixed:
“Earlier today, people may have experienced trouble accessing Facebook’s family of apps,” the rep said. “The issue has since been resolved, we are back to 100% for everyone and we’re sorry for any inconvenience.”
If you were looking to share a picture of your family or your Thanksgiving food spread, you might have to wait a little bit as Facebook and Instagram are both experiencing major outages on Thursday morning.
“We’re aware that some people are currently having trouble accessing Facebook’s family of apps, including Instagram. We’re working to get things back to normal as quickly as possible,” Instagram’s Twitter account shared. A Facebook representative shared the same comment when reached by TheWrap. Facebook is the parent company of Instagram.
Facebook’s issues appear to be hitting American users worse than Instagram; according to DownDetector.com, a site dedicated to tracking outages, Facebook had more than 10,000 reported problems between 6:00 a.m. and 8:00 a.m. PST. Most of the reported issues came from the East Coast. Instagram, on the other hand, had more reported issues — upwards of 15,000 — but they were more concentrated in Europe than the U.S.
As it typically goes when Facebook or Instagram is down, users flocked to Twitter to joke and complain about the minor inconvenience.
Facebook and Instagram is down so I've just invented a new social site. It's called "Outside."
— Eric Alper ? (@ThatEricAlper) November 28, 2019
me opening instagram for the 12th time even though i know it’s not working rn #instagramdown pic.twitter.com/wREYTQJykU
— allie ? (@alliehoffmannn) November 28, 2019
The amount of people running to twitter to complain because Facebook and Instagram is down: #InstagramDown pic.twitter.com/HcXqQdZuMm
— E (@iamOkon) November 28, 2019
Facebook and Instagram down. Everyone comes to Twitter like… pic.twitter.com/DRvMrw5TDw
— Todd Turner (@Maverick131108) November 28, 2019
Instagram and Facebook is down
Twitter: hello guys, welcome to twitter :)) #facebookdown #instagramdown pic.twitter.com/GzbRi82FXz
— ?????? (@suriyaiofficial) November 28, 2019
If it seems like this has happened more often in 2019, that’s because it has. Both Instagram and Facebook have experienced several other outages this year, with Instagram going down three times in the span of a month this past summer. Business Insider reported in July that Instagram went down twice as much in the first six months of 2019 as it has in previous years and that Facebook has experienced a nearly 300% surge in outages during the first half of the year.