Twitter users were unable to access the social media platform for about an hour on Thursday afternoon, with many encountering blank feeds, being logged out, or seeing messages telling them to 'try again later'. The outage affected both mobile and desktop users.
Outage monitor Downdetector began receiving user reports of problems at 12:45 BST, and by 13:12 had recorded nearly 30,000 complaints. The technical issues appeared to be resolved by 13:45.
At 14:10, Twitter Support tweeted: 'Some of you are having issues accessing Twitter - and we're working to get it back up and running for everyone. Thanks for sticking with us.' Internet disruption tracker NetBlocks later added that Twitter was 'experiencing major international outages'.
The disruption was one of the longest since Twitter went down for more than two hours in 2016. Users took to Instagram, Facebook and Reddit to vent their frustrations, with many reporting they were unable to send tweets or reload feeds.
The outage comes as Twitter prepares to sue Tesla chief executive Elon Musk for pulling out of his planned $44bn (£36.5bn) purchase of the company. A legal battle over Twitter's bot numbers and the terms of the deal now looms.
