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The great YouTube outage of 2026 - why the hell was YouTube down?

It wasn't just you - millions of YouTube users across the planet reported outages on Tuesday, February 17. We'll tell you what happened

Were you, like me, trying to rewatch the Black & White Spider-Noir trailer for the 1000th time on February 17, 2026, only to get an error message? Well, you weren't alone (especially in the Spider-Noir thing, we CageHeads stick together) - YouTube experienced a global outage on the evening of February 17, affecting everything from the YouTube app to YouTube Music to YouTube Kids and, of course, the YouTube homepage. So just what the hell happened?

Now we know.

Or at least, the good folks at Techradar know, which is where we got the explanation to the outage. According to the tech outlet, YouTube started going down just before 8PM ET on February 17. By 8:45, the site was reported as down across the internet, a decently rare occurrence in the social media platform's history (there was one last year, but we'll get to that in a second). Then, at a quarter after 9, YouTube itself commemted on the outages, posting to its social media: "If you’re having trouble accessing YouTube right now, you’re not alone — our teams are looking into this".

Fortunately, though the outage reached multiple corners of the globe, it didn't take that long for YouTube to find its footing again. By 9:30, reports were coming in that the page and apps were once again accessible to users, and swiftly after that, Google posted an official fix announcement on the YouTube help page. And not only that, they even offered an explanation.

"The issue with our recommendations system," read the statement, "has been resolved and all of our platforms (YouTube.com, the YouTube app, YouTube Music, Kids, and TV) are back to normal! We really appreciate you bearing with us while we sorted this out."

So the recommendations were the problem, eh? Well I could've told you there was a problem there - I keep getting recommended X-Men ship videos even though I do not look those up. Really! All that said, it's good to have YouTube back up and even get an explanation this time. The last time this occurred, October of 2025, was to a lesser extent, but we never got a reason for that one.

Anyway, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to head back to that Spider-Noir trailer. I'm working on getting the impression right.


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Grant DeArmitt

Grant DeArmitt: Grant DeArmitt (he/him) likes horror, comics, and the unholy union of the two. In the past, and despite their better judgment, he has written for Nightmare on Film Street and Newsarama. He lives in Brooklyn with his partner, Kingsley, and corgi, Legs.

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