The social media giant first reported problems at 12:20am GMT this morning. Most of the issues with the service have been reported in America and the UK, according to troubleshooting site Downdetector. Problems have also been reported in South America, New Zealand and Australia.
The outage is affecting mobile users but the desktop version is still working.
One user wrote on Twitter: “Searching #instagramdown and realising it’s not just my exceptionally s***ty WiFi and other people are suffering too.
Another wrote: “Who else only goes on Twitter when Instagram is down? #instagramdown.”
For those affected by the error, the app opened but did not refresh feeds with some fearing that their accounts had been deleted.
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For many, they received a message saying “5xx Server Error” which is not common.
Moreover, many users reported not being able to send messages or update their stories, although they were able to view stories which had been posted before the crash.
Instagram, which is owned by Facebook, has issued a statement regarding the isssue.
In the statement Instagram said: “We’re aware of an issue causing Instagram to be down for some users.
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“We know this is frustrating, and our team is working quickly to fix it”
This latest outage is the third in the last six months with the site crashing in October and November.
Along with Twitter, Instagram is one of the most used social media platforms in the world.
According to Statista the website has over a billion users worldwide.