Widespread Internet Disruption as X and Cloudflare Go Down
A significant internet outage struck on Tuesday morning, 18th November 2025, causing major disruptions for thousands of users across the UK and beyond. The social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, experienced a widespread failure, alongside web infrastructure provider Cloudflare, leading to a cascade of problems for numerous popular online services.
According to data from Downdetector, more than 5,600 users reported issues with accessing X during the Tuesday morning outage. The problem was not isolated to the social media platform, as Cloudflare, a critical company that provides security and performance services for a vast portion of the internet, also encountered significant technical difficulties.
Services Struggle to Recover
Cloudflare acknowledged the problem on its official status page, stating, "We are working to understand the full impact and mitigate this problem. More updates to follow shortly." The company later provided an update indicating that services were beginning to recover, but warned that customers might still observe higher-than-normal error rates as remediation efforts continued.
The exact cause of the outages and whether the issues at X and Cloudflare were directly related remained unclear at the time of reporting. However, the simultaneous failure had a domino effect, impacting a wide array of popular online platforms.
Far-Reaching Consequences for Major Platforms
The disruption extended far beyond X, affecting services relied upon by millions. Downdetector.com reported concurrent outages at several other major companies, including:
- OpenAI
- AWS (Amazon Web Services)
- bet365
- Canva
- Spotify
- BrightHR
- League of Legends
This pattern highlights a critical vulnerability in the modern, interconnected internet. Graeme Stuart, head of the public sector at cybersecurity firm Check Point, explained the severity of the situation. He noted that the Cloudflare outage fits the same pattern as recent failures with AWS and Azure, stating that "these platforms are vast, efficient and used by almost every part of modern life."
Mr Stuart elaborated on the core issue, explaining that the reported outages did not occur because each organisation failed independently. Instead, the problem arose because "a single layer they all rely on stopped responding." He criticised the current concentration of global internet traffic, pointing out that many organisations run everything through a single route without a meaningful backup. "When that route fails, there is no fallback. That is the weakness we keep seeing play out," he said.
This incident serves as a stark reminder of the internet's centralised structure, which was originally designed to be resilient through distribution. As services continue to recover, users are advised to refresh pages for the latest information.
