Facebook Messenger down: Chat app not working amid outage

Facebook Messenger has stopped working, amid reports of a global outage.

The chat app has stopped working for thousands of users, according to the site Down Detector. The problems appear to be clearing up, but it's possible messages may have been missed in the meantime.

Those reports were spread right across the world, it said. They were particularly focused in the Philippines – but that might simply be a consequence of who is using the app now, since problems were reported everywhere.

Multiple users reported that they couldn't log in, and that messages were failing to load.

Facebook Messenger is run as a separate app from the main site, but can be used from there. It also appears to suffer outages separately, though obviously issues can have knock-on effects between the two services.

The app goes down more rarely than Facebook-owned WhatsApp, which has suffered a number of significant outages in recent months. In all cases, the company doesn't usually comment on why the site experiences problems, though often apologises in the event of major issues.

The outage came just a day after Facebook announced that it was launching a special version of its app build specifically for kids. With that new launch, it will focus on attracting new users no older than 13, and as young as 6.