Massive tech outage brings down Amazon, Prime Video, Snapchat, Perpexity and Venmo

A major online outage on Monday disrupted several prominent platforms, including Amazon Web Services (AWS), Amazon.com, Prime Video, Alexa, Snapchat, Robinhood, Perplexity and PayPal’s Venmo, according to data from outage tracker Downdetector.

Major outage hits global platforms

The widespread disruption left users unable to access key services across multiple regions, with early indications pointing to an issue originating from AWS.

Perplexity’s chief executive confirmed that the outage was caused by problems within Amazon’s cloud infrastructure. As one of the world’s largest cloud computing providers, AWS supports a vast number of digital services, meaning a single technical failure can have far-reaching effects.

“Perplexity is down right now. The root cause is an AWS issue. We’re working on resolving it,” Perplexity’s chief executive, Aravind Srinivas, posted on X.

Amazon reacts to technical problems in US-EAST-1 region

Amazon confirmed on Monday that its cloud computing arm, Amazon Web Services (AWS), suffered a major outage, disrupting several prominent websites and apps around the world, including Snapchat, Robinhood and Coinbase.

In a status update, AWS acknowledged “increased error rates and latencies” affecting multiple services in its US-EAST-1 region, one of its largest data hubs. The company said it was working to restore normal operations but did not provide a timeline for resolution.

In the United States, the Amazon outage reached its peak at 1:04 PM IST, with over 15,000 users reporting issues. Of those affected, 50 per cent experienced problems with the mobile app, 29 per cent encountered issues on the home page, and 21 per cent reported difficulties with the shopping cart.

Impact on Amazon and other platforms

According to outage tracker Downdetector, Amazon.com, Prime Video, and Alexa were also experiencing technical issues. Payments service Venmo, operated by PayPal, reported similar problems.

The outage tracking website also reported that over 22,000 users in the US experienced Snapchat disruptions around 1:10 PM IST. Of those affected, 58 per cent encountered issues with the app, 38 per cent faced server connection problems, and three per cent reported difficulties accessing the website.