Daijiworld Media Network - New Delhi

New Delhi, Apr 12: Millions of users in India were left frustrated on Saturday as WhatsApp, the widely used messaging platform owned by Meta, suffered an unexpected outage. The disruption affected core functionalities like sending messages and uploading status updates.

Outage-tracking site Down Detector noted a significant spike in complaints, with nearly 81% of users reporting issues sending messages, and 16% facing broader app disruptions.

Confused users took to social media platform X to voice their concerns. “Is it just me, or is WhatsApp not working? My status isn’t uploading at all,” wrote one user, while another posted, “Hey @WhatsApp, is the app down? My messages won’t go through!”

As of now, WhatsApp has not issued an official statement explaining the cause or duration of the outage.

Interestingly, some users also flagged similar glitches on Facebook and Instagram, also under the Meta umbrella, raising questions about a broader issue within the company’s ecosystem.

This isn’t the first hiccup for WhatsApp in recent times. Back in late February, the app experienced a massive global outage, disrupting messaging, calls, and WhatsApp Web access for countless users. On that occasion, Down Detector logged over 9,000 user complaints in just a few hours.

Adding to the digital woes on Saturday, Unified Payments Interface (UPI) services also suffered a major glitch earlier in the day. Several online payment apps experienced downtime, affecting transactions across shopping, bill payments, and local businesses.

The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) acknowledged the issue via X, citing “intermittent technical problems” as the cause for partial UPI failures.

“We are working to resolve the issue and will keep you updated. We regret the inconvenience caused,” NPCI stated in their official post.

As users await clarity from both Meta and NPCI, the double disruption underscores the growing dependence on digital platforms—and the ripple effect when they falter.