Facebook and Instagram down as thousands unable to get on to popular apps

There were almost hundreds of reports of issues across Instagram and Facebook afternoon, with the Meta services apparently suffering an short-term outage. Independent tracker website DownDetector - which analyses mentions of issues across social media - diplayed more than 1,900 problem reports.

They began to pick up at around 3pm Wednesday, according to the website, with users from across the UK including London, Manchester, Nottingham and Glasgow reporting issues using the Meta apps. According to DownDetector, 65% of Facebook users reported problems with the server connection, 18% with login and 17% with the app as of 4.51pm.

And on Instagram, 89% have reported problems with the app, 10% with the website and 1% with the feed.

However, the last problem reports for Facebook and Instagram were at at 3.21 and 3.22pm respectively, and DownDetector says user reports "indicate no current problems at Instagram".

The graphs showing spikes in problem reports has returned back towards normal baseline levels.

Meanwhile, issues have also been reported on WhatsApp, 68% of which are to do with sending messages, 17% with the website and 15% with the app.

Meta has been approached for comment.