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Freedom251 › Blog › 2026

2026 Network Outages: Q1 Report and How to Check Your Internet

By Freedom251 Team · · 4 min read

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There is no complete 2026 outage total in the available reporting: Cloudflare’s summary covers the first quarter only, and it says its list of observed disruptions is not exhaustive. To check whether a problem is happening now, use an outage dashboard for regional or provider-level signals, then test your own connection separately. Those checks can narrow the picture, but neither alone identifies the root cause of a household fault.

What the 2026 outage report covers

Cloudflare Radar’s Q1 2026 disruption review covers January through March. Cloudflare describes it as “a summary overview of observed and confirmed disruptions” and says it is not an exhaustive or complete list of issues during the quarter. It therefore cannot support a full-year 2026 outage count or a claim that every incident is included.

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The examples below show how widely outage scale and cause can vary. They are not a complete incident list, and their traffic measurements use different signals and comparison baselines; they should not be added together or treated as counts of affected people.

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Major reported disruptions in Q1 2026

Location or network What Cloudflare reported Scope, timing and measurement
Uganda A nationwide shutdown coincided with a near-complete loss of traffic. The Uganda Internet Exchange Point (UIXP), as cited by Cloudflare, reported domestic exchange traffic falling from approximately 72 Gbps to 1 Gbps. The shutdown began January 13. Traffic remained effectively at zero through 20:00 UTC on January 17, when connectivity was partially restored. The Gbps figures are approximate UIXP figures, not a Cloudflare measurement.
Iran Cloudflare described nationwide shutdowns beginning January 8 and February 28. At the start of the second shutdown, Cloudflare Radar observed traffic falling to well under 1% of previous levels. Cloudflare said Iran remained effectively offline through the end of Q1. Its report also noted the shutdown remained largely in place as of late April; that update does not establish the situation in October.
Republic of Congo Cloudflare observed traffic falling to near zero for approximately 60 hours. The disruption began March 15, with traffic recovering around March 17. The report says authorities did not provide an official explanation.
Parts of Ukraine and Portugal Cloudflare attributed regional disruptions to power outages associated with attacks on energy infrastructure in parts of Ukraine and Storm Kristin in Portugal. During the Portugal event, Cloudflare Radar observed traffic declines of up to 70% in Leiria and 52% in Coimbra. These are traffic comparisons, not estimates of affected users.
Verizon Wireless and TalkTalk Cloudflare reported a Verizon Wireless service issue and a TalkTalk disruption, illustrating incidents limited to individual provider networks. The Verizon issue was reported January 14. During the March 25 TalkTalk disruption, Cloudflare observed provider traffic nearly 50% below the previous week.

How to check whether the internet is down right now

Check for a regional or provider-level disruption

Open Cloudflare Radar’s Outage Center to look for observed outages and traffic anomalies for a selected period. The dashboard defaults to the last seven days, and event times are shown in UTC. Check the location and network or autonomous system number (ASN), not just whether an event appears near your country: an incident may affect one provider rather than the whole area.

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Cloudflare’s Outage Center documentation describes event details such as location, affected ASN, type and scope, likely cause, and start and end times. The documentation also describes exploring impact through NetFlows and HTTP data, including comparisons such as mobile versus desktop traffic. A listed cause may be inferred from public information; treat it as likely or attributed unless a direct incident source confirms it.

Check access to a specific service

If the problem is limited to a Google product, consult Google’s Traffic and disruptions resource, which provides real-time information about access to Google products and services by country or region. It is a service-specific view, not a monitor for every internet provider or website.

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Test your own connection

Cloudflare Radar’s Internet Quality page links to Cloudflare Speed Test, which tests the connection from your test context. This can help establish whether your current connection is performing poorly, but the result alone cannot determine whether the cause is Wi-Fi, your router, the access line, your ISP, or the remote service you are trying to reach.

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The same page presents aggregate quality characteristics, including download speed based on Cloudflare test results over the preceding 90 days. That rolling, aggregated value is not a prediction of your own speed or a universal service standard.

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How to interpret outage signals

  • A dashboard event is an observation, not a diagnosis. It can show that traffic or access changed for a place or network, but it may not establish why your specific connection failed.
  • Compare like with like. A percentage decline needs its baseline and geography: for example, TalkTalk traffic relative to the previous week is not directly comparable to Portugal traffic declines in particular cities.
  • Remember that each dashboard has coverage limits. Cloudflare says Radar uses data from its global network and aggregated, anonymized data from its 1.1.1.1 public DNS resolver. These are Cloudflare’s described inputs, not a census of every network or internet user. Cloudflare says the Radar API is free and the data is available under CC BY-NC 4.0.
  • Use independent signals for different questions. A regional outage view, a service-specific availability page, and an individual speed test measure different things. Agreement may strengthen the case for a broader issue; disagreement does not by itself prove any one tool is wrong.

A practical troubleshooting sequence

  1. Check the scope: see whether multiple devices and services are affected, or only one device, one site, or one app.
  2. Look for an area or provider event: inspect the Outage Center for the relevant location and network, and note the event’s UTC time and stated scope.
  3. Check the affected service directly: for Google products, use Google’s country- or region-level traffic view; for other services, consult that service’s own availability information if available.
  4. Run a connection test: use Cloudflare Speed Test to assess the connection from your current test context, and distinguish that result from Radar’s rolling aggregate statistics.
  5. Compare the evidence before assigning a cause: a public traffic anomaly and a poor local test may coincide, but neither proves the other caused your issue. The dashboards provide useful signals; locating a fault on your home network or access line may require further troubleshooting with your ISP or equipment.

Product prices and availability are accurate as of the date/time indicated and are subject to change. Any price and availability information displayed on Amazon at the time of purchase will apply.

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