The biggest internet outages in history
The top 3 according to 6 votes from people: Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp (2021) · Dyn (2016) · Amazon Web Services (2017). (Updated Sep 2, 2026.)
The day CrowdStrike crashed millions of computers, the six hours without WhatsApp or Instagram, the typo that took down Amazon Web Services: the digital blackouts that showed how fragile the internet is. Which one did you suffer?
Automatically translated (original in Español). See the original
Top 11
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1
Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp (2021)
More than six hours without Meta's apps worldwide.
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2
Dyn (2016)
An attack using infected cameras and routers knocked out Netflix, Spotify and Twitter for half the world.
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3
Amazon Web Services (2017)
An engineer's typo paralysed Slack, Trello and iCloud for hours.
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4
Amazon Web Services (2025)
A failure in its main region took apps and websites offline around the world.
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5
BlackBerry (2011)
Three days without messages or email for millions of users.
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6
PlayStation Network (2011)
Shut for 24 days after an attack compromised more than 70 million accounts.
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7
CrowdStrike and Microsoft (2024)
A faulty update crashed 8.5 million Windows machines: the biggest IT outage in history.
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8
Fastly (2021)
One configuration change took down Reddit, Amazon and the UK government's website.
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9
Google (2020)
45 minutes without Gmail, YouTube or Drive.
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10
Rogers, Canada (2022)
12 million people without phone or internet for more than 15 hours.
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11
Verizon (2026)
About ten hours without service for around 1.5 million customers.
How is this ranking ordered? By people's votes: each ▲ adds a point and each ▼ takes one away. Anyone can vote and add what is missing.
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