Thousands of users across the UK have been left unable to send messages after major social media platforms WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger went down.
Outage monitoring site DownDetector reported a sharp spike in issues with both Meta-owned apps on Friday afternoon (February 28), with complaints flooding in from across the country.
At 3:30 pm, the number of users reporting outages on Facebook Messenger stood at around 150, but within minutes, this figure soared tenfold to over 1,700, indicating a widespread disruption.
WhatsApp, one of the world’s most popular messaging services, was also affected, with thousands of frustrated users taking to social media to report difficulties in sending and receiving messages.
Cause of the Outage Unclear
Meta has yet to issue an official statement on what caused the service disruption, but many users reported being unable to connect to chats or send messages across both platforms.
Global Impact?
While the outage appears to be affecting UK users the most, reports are emerging from other regions experiencing similar problems. The scale of the issue is still being assessed, but given Meta’s history of occasional global outages, a larger-scale technical failure cannot be ruled out.
Users Left Frustrated
Frustrated users have taken to X (formerly Twitter) and other online forums to vent their concerns. One user wrote, “WhatsApp not working? I thought my Wi-Fi was broken!” Another added, “Both WhatsApp and Messenger are down. What is happening?!”
More to Follow…
As Meta investigates the issue, users are advised to restart their apps and check DownDetector for real-time updates. We will continue to provide the latest developments as they unfold.
