Users affected by the Meta outage on Wednesday can now return to using Instagram and WhatsApp without further disruption.

According to the data monitoring site Downdetector, the outages began at around 6pm on Wednesday.

The site reported that more than 22,000 people were affected by the outage, with more than 18,000 people having difficulty using WhatsApp.

The data platform said that the published numbers refer to users who reported the incidents, while the actual number of people affected may vary.

"Thanks for bearing with us! We're 99 per cent of the way there - just doing some last checks,” Meta said in a post on X later on Wednesday evening. “We apologise to those who've been affected by the outage."

WhatsApp and Instagram also announced on social media that their platforms were back online.

On Wednesday, Meta announced that it was aware of a technical problem impacting users and their ability to access its apps, adding that it was working to resolve the issue as soon as possible.

Users reported having issues with both platforms in several areas of the world, including the UK, Europe, Asia, Australia, South America and the US.

Users reported a range of issues, including an inability to use the apps or check feeds.

In October 2021, Meta experienced a global outage that lasted almost six hours and affected all its major platforms including Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Oculus.

The outage was caused by a configuration error during routine maintenance, which disconnected Meta’s data centres.

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