Reddit Outage: Platform Faces Widespread Service Disruptions As Users Receive 'Blank Pages' and 'Elevated Errors'; Company Says Fix Being Implemented
Reddit users across the globe found themselves unable to access their favourite subreddits today, January 13, as the popular discussion platform experienced a significant service disruption. The outage saw a surge in reports as users were met with blank pages, "elevated errors," and app failures. Reddit's official status page confirmed the incident and acknowledged "elevated errors across reddit.com and native apps".
Mumbai, January 13: Reddit was down today, January 13. Thousands of Reddit users worldwide found themselves unable to access their favourite subreddits today, as the popular discussion platform experienced a significant service disruption. The outage, which began in the afternoon UK time (morning PT), saw a surge in reports as users were met with blank pages, "elevated errors," and app failures. By peak disruption, report volumes on monitoring sites like Downdetector had soared past 100,000, signalling one of the platform's most notable technical hurdles of the new year.
Scale of the Interruption
Reports began to spike around 4:30 PM UK time, affecting both the desktop website and native mobile applications. Users globally, with heavy concentrations in major hubs like London, New York, and Chicago, reported a total loss of service or "degraded performance." X Down: Global Outage Hits Elon Musk-Run Social Media Platform As Thousands Report Disruptions to Feeds and Logins.
Data from tracking services highlighted the nature of the errors:
App Connectivity: Approximately 54 per cent of users reported issues specifically with the mobile app.
Website Access: 37 per cent of reports cited the desktop version of the site failing to load.
Server Connection: Nearly 10 per cent of users faced direct server connection errors, indicating a deeper infrastructure issue.
Reddit’s Response and Investigation
Reddit's official status page confirmed the incident early on, acknowledging "elevated errors across reddit.com and native apps." The company’s engineering team moved the platform's status to "Degraded Performance" as they worked to identify the root cause.
By late afternoon, the company stated that the issue had been identified and a fix was being implemented. Unlike some previous outages linked to external Content Delivery Networks (CDNs), early analysis suggested this was an internal server-side matter, as there were no concurrent reports of widespread ISP or third-party cloud provider failures.
A Busy Week for Tech As X Also Faced An Outage
The Reddit disruption follows a pattern of technical instability across social media platforms this week. Just hours prior, X (formerly Twitter) also faced significant technical glitches, leading to speculation regarding potential shared infrastructure stress or a wave of backend updates across the industry. This outage comes at a time when Reddit’s stock (RDDT) has seen active trading, with investors closely watching the platform's reliability as it expands its AI and data-sharing partnerships. Despite the technical "blackout," the company's stock remained resilient throughout the day's trading session. ‘I Wanna See Them’: Unverified Reddit Post Claims Kartik Aaryan Sent Inappropriate Texts to Minor Girl on Social Media; Screenshots of Alleged Old Conversations Resurface Amid Actor’s Teen Dating Buzz.
Impact on the 'Front Page of the Internet'
The outage left millions of users unable to participate in daily discussions, ranging from financial threads on r/wallstreetbets to technical support communities. For many, the downtime was a reminder of the platform's central role in real-time information sharing. One user summarised the sentiment on Downdetector with a simple: "There's nowt there. It's broken."
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jan 13, 2026 11:38 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).