Amazon is down in an apparent outage affecting tens of thousands of shoppers

Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images Amazon appears to be experiencing an outage, and tens of thousands of shoppers say they're having trouble accessing Amazon's services. According to outage tracker Downdetector, reports of issues surged Thursday afternoon, reaching about 20,000 by 3:49 p.m. ET on March 5. Complaints first spiked around 2:30 p.m., when roughly 18,000 users reported problems. The number briefly dipped to around 16,000 before climbing again. Users on Downdetector said the probl...

5 Mar, 21:18 — 5 Mar, 21:21

Moderate (32/100)

2 sourcesNarrow spread2 regions

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Why this matters

Amazon is one of the world's largest e-commerce platforms, and an outage can cause significant disruption for consumers and businesses relying on its services. Prolonged or frequent outages can lead to substantial financial losses and erode customer trust.

ℹOnly 2 sources cover this story

Perspective Analysis

AI-generated comparison of how 2 sources cover this story

Coverage indicates Amazon is experiencing an apparent outage affecting tens of thousands of users, primarily in the US. While Business Insider reports on the outage itself, Hindustan Times raises questions about a potential cyberattack amid geopolitical tensions.

Coverage matrix

	Business Insider	hindustan-times
Mention of Iran tensions and cyberattack questions

Covered Divergent Not mentioned

What sources agree on

Amazon is experiencing an outage
Tens of thousands of shoppers are affected
The outage is primarily impacting users in the US

Where they diverge

Potential cause of the outage

Business Insider

An apparent outage with no specified cause

hindustan-times

Raises questions about a potential cyberattack amid Iran tensions

Key claims3 agreed · 1 unverified

✓

Amazon is currently experiencing an outage.

agreed·hindustan-timesBusiness Insider

✓

Tens of thousands of users are affected by the outage.

agreed·hindustan-timesBusiness Insider

✓

The outage is primarily affecting users in the US.

agreed·hindustan-timesBusiness Insider

The outage might be due to a cyberattack amid Iran tensions.

unverified·hindustan-times

Coverage gaps

Mention of Iran tensions and cyberattack questions

Reportedhindustan-times

MissingBusiness Insider

Perspective Analysis

Comparing sources…

Story evolution

The narrative shifted from a simple outage report to include speculation about a potential cyberattack and its connection to international tensions.

Initial Outage Report2026-03-05T21:18:32.000Z

Reports emerge of Amazon services being down for tens of thousands of users in the US.

Speculation on Cause2026-03-05T21:21:22.000Z

Questions are raised about the possibility of a cyberattack, linking it to broader geopolitical tensions.

How outlets covered this

Left-leaning

No articles

Center

hindustan-times

Amazon hacked? Major outage amid Iran tensions raises cyberattack questions; ‘When will it be back up?’

Business Insider