Is your website down?

Quick checks and examples to help you diagnose outages — terminal commands, online tools and when to automate monitoring.

Quick checklist

  • Try loading the site from a different network (mobile tethering).
  • Check DNS — make sure your domain resolves and the records are correct.
  • Inspect server processes and logs if you control the host.
  • Use the commands below to test connectivity from your machine.

Ping (ICMP) — quick reachability test

Ping tests whether the host responds to network packets. Not all servers allow ICMP.

# Linux / macOS
ping -c 4 example.com

# Windows (PowerShell)
ping -n 4 example.com

Traceroute — see where packets stop

Traceroute (tracert on Windows) shows the path packets take. Useful to find network hops causing issues.

# Linux
traceroute example.com

# macOS (uses traceroute too)
traceroute example.com

# Windows (Command Prompt / PowerShell)
tracert example.com

HTTP checks — curl

Use curl to inspect HTTP status codes and headers.

curl -I https://example.com
# or follow redirects
curl -L -I https://example.com

Online tools

  • isup.me — quick global reachability check (visit isup.me).
  • DownDetector — community reports & outage maps (visit downdetector.com).
  • Third-party monitors — many providers offer free/paid checks from multiple locations.

What else to check

  • DNS TTL and recent changes — incorrect DNS often causes site unreachability.
  • SSL certificate validity — expired certs cause browsers to refuse connections.
  • Rate limits / WAF rules — some protection layers block legitimate traffic.
  • Hosting provider status pages — the provider may be experiencing an outage.

Manual vs automated monitoring

Doing these checks manually works in a pinch, but it's slow and error-prone. If you run a website, you want automation: periodic checks from multiple locations, alerts to your team, and a public status page so users know what's happening.

Automate for free with Hosted Status Page

Hosted Status Page runs checks for you, shows historical uptime, and notifies your team. You can start for free — it saves time and keeps your users informed. Perfect for site owners who want reliable monitoring without ops overhead.

Interested? See plans & get started — or create a free account to try automated checks right away.

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Quick tool

Paste your URL and run one of the commands above in your terminal — or try the quick online check below.

When to worry
  • Repeated failed checks from different networks
  • Provider status shows degraded service
  • SSL or DNS issues persist after troubleshooting