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    Diagnostics

    How do I know if a website is really down or just down for me?

    Part of Uptime monitoring — the full answer, the facts and the alternatives in one place.

    Quick answer

    How do I know if a website is really down or just down for me?

    Check the site from three independent spots — a different network, a VPN, and an external checker like Lemwatch's is-down probe. If two report the same failure it's a real outage; if only your network fails, it's local.

    • Local DNS cache poisoning and ISP outages cause about 30% of "the site is down" reports.
    • A traceroute reveals whether packets stop at your ISP, the transit provider, or the origin.
    • External is-down checkers use a global probe network and cache results for ~5 minutes.
    • If DNS resolves but the socket times out, the origin is up but blocked by a firewall or WAF.

    Step-by-step

    1. 1
      Try a different network

      Load the site on cellular / a VPN. If it works, the problem is your ISP or local DNS.

    2. 2
      Run an external checker

      Open Lemwatch's is-down page — it probes from a global network and shows regional status.

    3. 3
      Traceroute the hostname

      Run traceroute or mtr to see where packets stop: your ISP, transit, or the origin.

    4. 4
      Confirm before escalating

      Only page the on-call once two independent sources report the same failure.

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    Last verified: by the Lemwatch research team.

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