Verizon Suffers Major Nationwide Outage, Leaving Thousands of Users in “SOS Mode”

August 30, 2025 | NEW YORK

Today, Verizon experienced a widespread service disruption that left thousands of customers across the United States unable to make calls, send texts or access mobile data, with many iPhone users reporting their devices stuck in “SOS mode.”

The outage first emerged around 1:43 p.m. EDT, according to outage monitoring site Downdetector, which recorded over 10,000 incident reports by 2:30 p.m. EDT. The hardest-hit areas included New York, Los Angeles, Minneapolis and Chicago, where users were cut off from critical services such as business communications and two-factor authentication.

Verizon’s official support channels acknowledged the disruption shortly after reports surged, stating that “our engineers are working to identify and resolve the problem.” The carrier did not provide a cause or an estimated restoration time. In the interim, customers were advised to restart their devices and enable Wi-Fi calling where available to maintain connectivity.

The incident marks Verizon’s third significant network outage this year, following service interruptions in March and September. Social media platforms, particularly X (formerly Twitter), saw an influx of frustrated customers demanding explanations and accountability, with many questioning the reliability of the premium-priced service.

Apple Support clarified that “SOS mode” on an iPhone indicates an inability to connect to the carrier’s network, although emergency calls remain possible. Android users reported analogous issues, noting displays of “No Service” or automatic toggling to “SOS”.

Verizon has not yet disclosed the root cause of the outage or when full service will be restored. As the carrier investigates, subscribers nationwide continue to navigate workarounds and seek updates from customer support.