Amazon Web Services encountered a major outage on December 25, disrupting thousands of websites and gaming platforms during peak holiday traffic.
The incident registered over 3,200 user reports on Downdetector, representing the third large-scale AWS failure in the year. Gaming services faced severe impacts, with Epic Games Store, Fortnite, Steam, Xbox, and PlayStation Network among those affected. Users attempting logins on Christmas Eve met authentication errors, while others experienced sudden disconnections from ongoing matches.
Financial platforms also suffered, as social media reports indicated disruptions at Coinbase and Robinhood. The outage struck during heightened online activity tied to the holiday season. Players across console, PC, and mobile devices shared screenshots of error messages on various platforms.
“Christmas Eve traditionally sees a surge in Fortnite activity, with players logging in to enjoy festive events, holiday‑themed cosmetics, and limited‑time challenges,” according to Swikblog. This surge amplified the disruption’s reach, leaving users unable to access anticipated content and features.
AWS handles roughly half of the Internet’s backend operations, so such outages affect numerous dependent services at once. The December 24 event echoes a prior disruption in October 2025, which persisted for 15 hours and amassed over 17 million Downdetector reports worldwide.
Benzinga noted that when one company’s outage halts large portions of the Internet, it raises questions of scale, prompting calls for stricter antitrust measures and resilience requirements for cloud providers. This perspective references prior statements from Senator Elizabeth Warren.
Amazon has not disclosed the outage’s cause or provided an estimated timeline for complete service restoration.
