Verizon restored cellular service late Wednesday after a major outage disrupted service for nearly 10 hours. The issue left hundreds of thousands of customers without mobile internet and phone access across the United States.
Reports of the outage surged throughout the day. According to Downdetector, user complaints peaked at almost 173,000 around 12:50 p.m. EST. Reports began to decline slowly in the afternoon but remained high for several hours.
Verizon confirmed shortly after 10 p.m. EST that the problem had been resolved. The company advised customers still facing issues to restart their devices to reconnect to the network.
In a statement, Verizon apologized for the disruption. The company said it let customers down and acknowledged that users expect better reliability. Verizon also confirmed that affected customers will receive account credits, with details to be shared directly.
The cause of the outage has not been disclosed. Verizon said there was no indication of a cyberattack, a possibility that was reviewed with help from law enforcement agencies. The total number of impacted users remains unclear.
The outage raised concerns about emergency access in major cities. Officials in Washington, D.C., warned that some Verizon users could not reach 911 and advised people to use other carriers or visit police or fire stations if needed.
New York City officials said emergency services remained operational and were monitoring the situation. LinkNYC kiosks across the city also displayed warnings about the Verizon outage affecting emergency calls.
This is not the first major disruption for Verizon. In August 2025, customers across multiple states reported losing service, with phones showing SOS mode. That outage also led to thousands of complaints before service was restored.
