A major outage at Amazon Web Services (AWS) caused extensive internet disruptions, taking down numerous popular apps, games, and websites, including Snapchat, Roblox, Fortnite, Duolingo, and Ring.
The incident began around 8 AM UK time (midnight PT) and rapidly affected multiple platforms that rely on AWS for cloud hosting and data processing. Globally, Snapchat users have been unable to access the app, send messages, or connect to servers—indicating that the problem is widespread.
The issue has been traced to Amazon’s North Virginia (US-EAST-1) data centers, which are currently experiencing elevated error rates and service slowdowns. Since these facilities support a significant portion of the internet’s cloud infrastructure, disruptions there can easily cascade across numerous online services.
According to AWS’s official status page, several key systems—including Amazon DynamoDB and Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)—are facing technical difficulties. With thousands of companies depending on these services to run their apps, the outage has triggered a chain reaction, taking multiple major platforms offline at once.
Among the major platforms and services confirmed to be experiencing issues are:
- Social Media: Snapchat
- Gaming: Roblox, Fortnite, Epic Games Store, Clash Royale, Clash of Clans, Rocket League, Dead by Daylight, VRChat, Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege, PlayStation Network
- Productivity & Education: Canva, Duolingo, Canvas by Instructure
- Amazon’s Own Services: Amazon.com, Amazon Alexa, Ring, Amazon Prime Video
- Finance & Streaming: Venmo, Robinhood, Chime, Coinbase, Crunchyroll
Data from Downdetector shows a sharp rise in user complaints for Snapchat, with many reporting that features like Snap scores and maps aren’t loading. Similar problems are being reported by players of Roblox and Fortnite, as well as users of Duolingo and Ring.
Amazon has confirmed the issue and stated that its technical teams are working to restore full functionality. However, the company has not provided a specific timeframe for when all services will be back online. Until AWS resolves the problems at its North Virginia data centers, users may continue to experience intermittent outages or unreliable performance across several apps and services.
