Reddit is back online after a prolonged outage earlier on Monday left thousands of users unable to access the social media platform.
Both the Reddit website and mobile app appear to be working as normal now.
Users in the UK and US began reporting problems with Reddit as early as 5am this morning, according to website disruption tracker Down Detector.
During the crash, the Reddit website was displaying a blank page with an error message that read “no healthy upstream”.
getting this error on reddit // is reddit down pic.twitter.com/jFFPzjfiTr
— emily lipstein (@emily_lip) October 14, 2024
This means that a site is struggling to connect to its backend servers or can’t translate its domain name into a corresponding IP address.
Other users have reported seeing different error messages on the site, including “upstream connect error”.
Reddit has since acknowledged the issue on its official status page, writing: “We are currently experience a performance degradation of our service. We are working to fix the problem.”
Come on Reddit, be honest pic.twitter.com/ZHjaw4c1jO
— Thomas Sanlis 🥐 (@T_Zahil) October 14, 2024
How to use Reddit during downtime
If ever Reddit does go down again, savvy users have found a workaround that can help you access the site.
All you need to do is visit “old Reddit,” the original, no-frills version of the platform. You can access it by typing old.reddit.com into the URL bar on a browser and, if you like it, you can set your Reddit preferences to revert to the original design.
Reddit down? No problem! pic.twitter.com/cCBdRNYViv
— Jesus (@gsusMad) October 14, 2024
By visiting old Reddit, you can bypass some of the fancy (and sometimes buggy) parts of New Reddit, keeping you connected to your favorite subreddits even during Reddit outages.
Some users even prefer it due to its uncluttered design and the ease with which you can browse lengthier comment threads.
Reddit hasn’t experienced a major crash for several years now. However, the site did undergo a blackout last year as a result of widespread user protests over its controversial data policy.
Some of Reddit’s largest forums (known as subreddits), each boasting tens of millions of followers, took part in the blackout, resulting in limited access for users.
