Tag: verizon outage

  • The Verizon outage that left more than a million without cell service yesterday is fixed, but what caused it?

    The Verizon outage that left more than a million without cell service yesterday is fixed, but what caused it?

    The Verizon outage that left more than a million without cell service yesterday is fixed, but what caused it?

    Yesterday for upwards of 12 hours Verizon customers trying to use their phone to call, text or even browse the web would be out of luck. The service was down for more than a million customers and an announcement of the outage wasn’t sent out until 10:30 PM Eastern Standard Time.

    This Isn’t the first massive Verizon outage we’ve reported on, or the first outage for a cell phone carrier, being without a phone even temporarily in 2026 can feel like being cut off from the world. Verizon has announced that customers can anticipate a credit for the downtime soon, but details are not available as to the amount that will be issued at the time of writing.

    The company responded to customers on X with the following after the outage:


    “The outage has been resolved. If customers are still having an issue, we encourage them to restart their devices to reconnect to the network. For those affected, we will provide account credits. Details will be shared directly with customers. We sincerely apologize for the disruption.”

    As with prior cellphone service outages customer phones were left stuck in “SOS” mode which indicates you’re not connected to your providers network and the only type of calls you can make are those to emergency services like 911. If this happens to you, it may leave you wondering if it’s you or it’s the service.

    Here are three steps you can take to determine if your service is really out or it’s just your phone:

    1. Toggle Airplane Mode
    • Turn Airplane Mode ON for ~30 seconds, then turn it OFF.
    • This forces the phone to re-register with nearby cellular towers.
    2. Restart the Phone
    • Power the phone fully off (not just a quick reboot), wait 30 seconds, then turn it back on.
    • This clears temporary radio/network glitches.
    3. Check Cellular & SIM Settings
    • Confirm Cellular Data is enabled, and the correct network is selected (Automatic is best).
    • If the phone uses a physical SIM, remove it, reseat it, and try again.
    • If it’s an eSIM, toggle the line off/on if possible.

    While we didn’t report on it at the time, Verizon also suffered a major outage in just August of last year but that outage was smaller in scale and duration. Verizon has 146.1 million customers across the United States. As of writing they have not released the cause of yesterday’s outage but have announced it was not due to a cyber-attack.
    Downtime of any kind can be highly disruptive to your business in the following ways:

    1. Lost Revenue
    When systems are down, sales stop. This can mean missed transactions, abandoned orders, or billable work that simply can’t happen.
    2. Reduced Productivity
    Employees can’t access tools, data, or systems they rely on, leading to idle time, delays, and expensive workarounds.
    3. Damage to Reputation & Trust
    Customers notice outages. Repeated or prolonged downtime can erode confidence, trigger complaints, and push clients toward competitors.
    As with the Verizon outage, customers were upset and repeated outages are a hit to their overall reputation. Valley Techlogic can protect your business from unnecessary technical outages and downtime, learn more today through a consultation.



  • Verizon’s massive outage this week and it’s connection to Hurricane Helene

    Verizon’s massive outage this week and it’s connection to Hurricane Helene

    While much of the eastern side of the country continues to grapple with the effects of Hurricane Helene (in particular western North Carolina which had many towns wiped off the map), restoring cellular communication has been a top priority to locate and aid those currently affected.

    In order to do that, cellular communication providers have enabled something called “disaster roaming” in the effected areas, this type of roaming services allows customers of any mobile phone company to use any available cell tower. Normally, cell towers are maintained and restricted to certain companies. So, for example, you may find as an AT&T customer you have better service in one locations vs another. With disaster roaming turned on this would no longer be the case.

    What does this have to do with the Verizon outage that occurred this week? Well, this unplanned outage that affected as of writing caused over 100,000 reports from customers on DownDetector.com, a site that reports service complaints, also affected the areas currently recovering from Hurricane Helene.

    Users reported their phones being stuck in “SOS” mode, and after several hours issued a statement that their engineers had fixed the issue and that anyone still affected should try restarting their phones. During the outage the company’s response was underwhelming, in many cases just informing customers they were “aware of the issue”.

    The timing of this outage and the announcement that disaster roaming was turned on in certain areas is also possibly worth investigating, though no announcement on the cause of the outage has been revealed at this time.

    This is also not the first time we’ve written about a major cellular outage (AT&T and T-Mobile have had their fair share as well). Disasters like the one currently ongoing in North Carolina highlight our need to have effective ways to communicate in times of an emergency and it is past time that cellular companies be held to a higher standard when it comes to communicating and addressing outages that can have drastic consequences for their customers.

    Effective communication is an important part of running a business, if you’re not making your customers aware of your intentions then you’re leaving it up to them to draw conclusions on your behalf. Below are five ways Valley Techlogic addresses communicating with clients who have a technology service plan with us:

    Don’t settle for underwhelming or non-existent communication on the services you pay for, learn more about how Valley Techlogic can support your business today with a free consultation.

    Looking for more to read? We suggest these other articles from our site.

    This article was powered by Valley Techlogic, leading provider of trouble free IT services for businesses in California including Merced, Fresno, Stockton & More. You can find more information at https://www.valleytechlogic.com/ or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/valleytechlogic/ . Follow us on Twitter at https://x.com/valleytechlogic and LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/valley-techlogic-inc/.