X (Twitter) Down Again? Here’s What Happened, What’s Working, and How to Get Back Online

X's official engineering account acknowledged the problem yesterday and explained the problem was due to a data center outage.

“X is aware some of our users are experiencing performance issues on the platform today,” the account posted

“We are experiencing a data center outage and the team is actively working to remediate the issue.”

X is aware some of our users are experiencing performance issues on the platform today. We are experiencing a data center outage and the team is actively working to remediate the issue.May 22, 2025

TL;DR

Root cause: Fire in an X-leased data centre in Hillsboro, Oregon.

First impact: Thu May 22 2025, ~19:00 WAT (2 p.m. ET).

Peak disruption: 6 000+ outage reports on Sat May 24.

Still broken: Log-ins with 2FA, Direct Messages, OAuth sign-ins.

Work-arounds: Stay logged in if possible, clear app cache, toggle “Filter low-quality messages.”

Why Your X Feed Went Silent

On Thursday, May 22 (19:00 WAT / 14:00 ET), DownDetector lit up with thousands of red spikes as users worldwide—Nigeria, US, UK, Germany, Peru—reported X wasn’t loading on either desktop or mobile. By evening, the counter topped 2 500 reports.

Official line: @XEng tweeted that a “data centre outage” was slowing the platform and engineers were “actively working to remediate.”

Twenty-four hours later, DMs, timelines, and even ads were still breaking. The culprit? A fire in the Hillsboro, Oregon facility that houses critical X servers, according to Wired sources. Emergency crews battled the blaze for five hours, knocking key systems offline.

Saturday Spike: The Outage That Wouldn’t Quit

Just when users thought the storm had passed, Saturday, May 24 (08:00 ET / 13:00 WAT) delivered a fresh blow—6 000+ new outage reports. X’s own developer status page showed “degraded performance” across:

Login with X (OAuth)

Two-Factor Authentication

Direct Messages (DMs)

API v2

If you were already logged in, you probably saw feeds crawl but not crash. The bigger headache? Anyone logged out—or forced out—couldn’t get back in because the 2FA text/push codes never arrived.

Quick Fixes You Can Try (Tested in Lagos)

Issue Fast Work-Around

Can’t log in (2FA hangs) Log in via Google/Apple, or disable 2FA via X Support (yes, it’s tedious).

DMs won’t load In Settings › Privacy & safety › Direct Messages, toggle “Filter low-quality messages” on → navigate away → toggle off. Many users report this refreshes the inbox.

App keeps looping Update the X app, clear its cache, or switch to the mobile browser version.

Everything is slow VPN to a different region can help if a nearby edge server is overloaded.

Pro-Tip for Nigerians: INTERNET speeds vary by ISP; Spectranet and MTN 5G performed better during the May 24 spike than Glo or Airtel in our tests.

Should You Jump Ship? Best X Alternatives in 2025

Platform What You’ll Love Why It’s Hot in NG

Bluesky Twitter-style feeds, no ads Growing Naija tech community, local hashtags (#TechNG)

Threads Instagram integration High engagement during #BBNaija season

Mastodon Open-source, no algorithm Nigerian “instance” @nigeria.social trending

Nostr Decentralised, crypto-native Built-in Lightning tips for Bitcoin micro-payments

(P.S. Follow us on TikTok @YourHandle for bite-sized outage updates and on YouTube for deep-dives.)

Timeline of Key Events (WAT)

May 22, 19:00 – First major spike on DownDetector (2 500 reports).

May 22, 23:40 – X API listed as “degraded”; feeds partly load.

May 23, 04:00 – Fire confirmed at Hillsboro data centre.

May 23, 20:30 – Login/OAuth flows degraded; 2FA failing.

May 24, 13:00 – Outage reports surge to 6 000+.

May 24, 14:00 – Some functionality restored; reports drop below 100.

SEO Keywords To Watch

Primary: X outage, Twitter down, May 22 2025 X crash

Secondary: Hillsboro data centre fire, X 2FA broken, DownDetector reports, X direct messages not working, Twitter alternatives Nigeria

Final Word

The May 2025 X outage is a reminder of how concentrated data-centre infrastructure can bottleneck global conversations. Keep tabs on @XEng and status.glo.com (Dev page) for live updates—and bookmark this article; we’ll update as soon as X flips the all-clear switch.

Meanwhile, stay logged in, keep backups of your 2FA codes, and diversify your social feeds. Outages happen; losing your voice online shouldn’t.