We started our day today much like many of you did: with downed website notifications. Except on our end it was roughly 50 of them! If you’re seeing error messages on your website this morning, take a deep breath—it’s not your fault, and more importantly, there’s nothing you can do to fix it right now. A major global outage at Cloudflare, one of the internet’s core infrastructure providers, is affecting websites across the world.
What Happened
At approximately 6:00 AM ET this morning, Cloudflare detected a spike in unusual traffic to one of its services, which caused widespread errors across its network Tom’s HardwareCNBC. The company reported “widespread 500 errors” with their Dashboard and API also failing Tom’s Guide.
By 8:09 AM ET, Cloudflare identified the issue and began implementing a fix Cloudflare. As of 8:35 AM ET, the company has made changes allowing some services like Cloudflare Access and WARP to recover, with error levels returning to pre-incident rates Cloudflare. However, full restoration is still ongoing. The company has stated they do not yet know what caused the unusual traffic spike CNBC.
You can monitor real-time updates on the official Cloudflare Status Page.
Why So Many Sites Are Affected
If you’re unfamiliar with Cloudflare, here’s why this one company’s problems are causing such widespread chaos: Cloudflare provides critical internet infrastructure services including content delivery (CDN), DDoS protection, security features, and performance optimization. The company’s services power approximately 20.4% of all websites on the internet Newsweek.
When Cloudflare experiences issues, it doesn’t just affect their customers—it can take down huge swaths of the internet. This morning’s outage has impacted major platforms including X (formerly Twitter), ChatGPT/OpenAI, Spotify, League of Legends, Canva, DoorDash, Zoom, and Facebook NewsweekWindows Central. Even DownDetector, the popular site people use to check if services are down, was affected—which created an ironic problem for people trying to verify the outage.
Users attempting to access affected websites are seeing error messages like “Internal server error Error code 500” or “Please unblock challenges.cloudflare.com to proceed.” These messages indicate that Cloudflare’s systems, which sit between users and the actual websites, are experiencing problems.
Why There’s No User-Side Fix
Here’s the most important thing to understand: this is entirely a server-side issue, which means clearing your browser cache, restarting your router, or changing DNS settings will not fix the problem Dataconomy. Your website isn’t broken—the infrastructure that delivers it to visitors is temporarily disrupted.
The only solution is to wait while Cloudflare’s engineers work to resolve the issue Dataconomy. This isn’t a reflection of your website’s quality, your hosting provider’s reliability, or your technical setup. When core internet infrastructure experiences problems, everyone who depends on it simply has to wait for restoration.
The Bigger Picture
This isn’t an isolated incident. Less than a month ago, Amazon Web Services suffered a major disruption, followed by an outage of Microsoft’s Azure cloud services CNBC. These recurring events highlight a growing concern about internet infrastructure centralization—too much of the web depends on too few providers.
These services exist because they offer tremendous benefits: better security, faster load times, DDoS protection, and global content delivery. However, the tradeoff is that when they fail, the impact is massive and widespread. It’s the internet equivalent of a major highway closure affecting thousands of commuters simultaneously.
What to Expect Next
Cloudflare’s engineering team is actively working on full restoration. Based on their track record and current progress, services should return to normal within hours. Continue monitoring the Cloudflare Status Page for the latest updates.
If you have questions about how this affects your specific website or want to discuss backup strategies for future incidents, don’t hesitate to reach out to us. Remember: your site will be back online as soon as Cloudflare completes their repairs—no action needed on your end.