AWS outage disrupts major platforms including Snapchat, Fortnite and Coinbase
A major outage in Amazon Web Services (AWS) on 20 October disrupted global access to several major online platforms including Snapchat, Fortnite, Coinbase, and Canva. The issue, traced to AWS’s US-EAST-1 region, led to widespread latency and connectivity problems across websites and mobile applications.
- Amazon Web Services (AWS) experienced a widespread outage on 20 October, affecting major apps and websites globally.
- The disruption, centred on the US-EAST-1 region, impacted firms such as Snapchat, Fortnite, Coinbase, Robinhood, and Canva.
- Amazon confirmed increased error rates and latency issues, which caused temporary downtime for multiple services.
Amazon Web Services (AWS), the cloud computing arm of Amazon, suffered a significant outage on Monday, 20 October 2025, leading to widespread service disruptions across multiple platforms and industries.
The company confirmed on its AWS Service Health Dashboard that it was “experiencing increased error rates and latencies for multiple AWS Services in the US-EAST-1 Region,” one of its most heavily used data centre zones.
According to Downdetector, the outage caused downtime for several high-profile websites and applications, including Snapchat, Signal, Epic Games, Canva, and Amazon’s own services such as Prime Video and Alexa.
Popular gaming titles such as Fortnite, Roblox, Clash Royale, and Clash of Clans also faced interruptions, leaving millions of players unable to connect.
Financial platforms including Venmo, Chime, and Coinbase were affected, while Lyft, a major ride-hailing competitor to Uber, experienced app failures across the United States.
AI startup Perplexity, cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, and trading app Robinhood publicly attributed the disruptions to AWS.
Coinbase at 3.46pm stated, “We are aware many users are currently unable to access Coinbase due to an AWS outage. Our team is working on the issue and we’ll provide updates here. All funds are safe.”
Meredith Whittaker, President of Signal, confirmed the outage’s impact on the messaging service via a post on X, while Canva said on its official X account that its website was down as of 5.20 pm on 20 October and that its team was working to restore access.
AWS, which provides cloud computing power, data storage, and digital services to organisations worldwide, is a key backbone for much of the internet’s infrastructure. Disruptions in its operations can ripple across sectors, temporarily paralysing online services that depend on its systems.
AWS competes with Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure, both of which hold significant shares in the global cloud services market.
Outages of this scale are rare but have previously exposed the fragility of modern internet ecosystems heavily reliant on a few dominant cloud providers.
As of late Monday, Amazon had not released a detailed explanation of the root cause, though internal teams were reportedly investigating and working to restore full functionality to affected services.
