How to test if a website or web page is down

There are chances that users may have trouble accessing your website. However, you find that the website is functioning normally when you attempt to access it yourself. There are cases a website's web server, routers, as well as other components that connect your computer to the server can all get down. The routers or web servers can be unavailable due to patching, maintenance, changes, or other issues. When this occurs, your computer may experience a timeout or an error (such as a 404 error) when you are attempting to access a website.

Sometimes DNS settings, hosting companies, or web apps may be the reason to down your website. An offline website can also generate security problems, which occur by DDoS attacks or when hackers try to infiltrate your website with malicious malware. The tests you can run to establish whether the issue is on your end, in between, or with the web server are listed below.

Test your Internet connection

A website may appear to be down if your Internet connection is stable or down. With the help of visiting a website you have never been to, you can easily determine if you are facing this issue. For instance, your Internet connection is probably not the issue if you are visiting this website on the same Internet connection for the first time.

Refresh your browser or try another browser

Sometimes your web browser may be the source of your issues in some situations. To help make sure that is not the issue, ensure to refresh the web page with the help of pressing F5 on your keyboard. If this does not work for you, try to use a different browser if you have installed it (such Google Chrome or Firefox) on your system.

You should clear your browser's cache if the website is not working in your browser of choice; it is working in a different browser. You may need to return the browser to its default settings if this doesn't work.

Test and reset your router

It is typical for home routers and broadband modems to have issues that prevent websites and web pages from working. Routers frequently have issues with their routing tables, which causes websites or web pages not to work. Also conceivable is the appearance that all websites function well other than one.

You need to disconnect the power wire from your router or modem and keep it unplugged for a while (10 seconds) to assist make sure you are not experiencing an issue with your router. Reconnect the device's power cable, wait a short while, and then attempt the website or web page again.

Tip

Be sure to restart your browser after trying the website again (usually with the help of pressing F5 on the keyboard). If not, the computer may utilize a cached copy of the website.

Test site using an online service

If you have followed all of the instructions above and you are still facing a problem accessing a website, check to see if the issue is on their end. Using a third-party service to check whether a website is up or down is the most effective way to test this. There are some online services available to check whether a website is up or down, which are as follows:

• Down For Everyone Or Just Me
• IsItDown

If you check a website by using these services and this indicates that a website or web page is up, you are still facing issues accessing it; one of the following issues may be at blame:

• There may be an issue with your Internet connection.
• Your IP address may be banned.
• Organization or school has banned the website.

We advise you to verify there is not an issue with your ISP (Internet service provider). You can ensure it with the help of calling their support to confirm the problem is not on their end. You are required to contact the administrator of the network if you are using a computer at a school or job.

Tip

Turning off your smartphone's Wi-Fi is another way to test a website, and the web page is getting down. While using your phone's cellular data service, check to see if the same problem happens with Wi-Fi being turned off. It is a router or computer issue if the website functions properly on your phone.

Traceroute the connection

With the help of doing a traceroute on the IP address or domain you are trying to access, further troubleshooting can be done. You can determine if one of the routers between you and the web server is the issue by running a traceroute.

Root Cause Analysis

When you have alerted about your website accessibility problems, you are required, in this case, to get more information about the problem in order to assign IT staff to resolve and make your website accessible once again. Some monitoring tools frequently send further information. In order to identify and address the issue, this data is also referred to as root cause analysis, which can comprise HTTP status codes, request content, resolving IP tests, DNS failures, and traceroute.

HTTP status codes typically help to understand particular problems; for instance, the 404-error code denotes that a specific page was not found; it may be the consequence of an incorrectly configured check, an unintentional deletion of a page, or a failed redirect.

Similar to this, traceroute reveals where in the network routing, the test request failed to reach the server for your website. If it does not become successful and fails closer to your web server, it can be a network configuration issue with the server or your hosting company. DNS issues with your DNS host or service provider may be discovered by resolving IP testing.

Uptime monitoring is important, but it's not enough to guarantee the availability of your website on its own. There are some other issues, such as broken navigation flow or a slow-loading page, which can also affect your visitors' experience and increase your bounce rate. Furthermore, a performance metric that can also have an impact on search engine rankings.

In addition to uptime, certain uptime monitoring systems, such as Pingdom, offer features including transactional, page speed, and real user monitoring in order to assist you more thoroughly keep an eye on your website's performance.

Page speed monitoring: In order to evaluate a website's performance, page speed monitoring helps to measure how quickly it loads first- and third-party resources. This enables you to measure your website optimization and address loading issues before they have an impact on a larger user base.

Transaction monitoring: It helps to monitor important navigational flows on your websites, like payments, orders, and sign-ups. To prevent the loss of money and engagement, this aids in the early correction of transactional problems.

Together transaction monitoring, page load, and uptime rely on automation and simulation approaches to carry out monitoring. Therefore, they are referred to as synthetic monitoring.

Synthetic monitoring might not catch every potential problem with downtime, page loading, and transactions; however, it is necessary to make sure your website is available and working as it should. For case, a navigational flow may break on mobile devices, or a certain subpage may load slowly on a certain browser or device type. Synthetic monitoring can't possibly account for every possible circumstance because your consumers could be using any browser or device platform in any location.

Usually, real user monitoring software frequently injects a small piece of code throughout your website, which helps to gather real-time visitor activity data directly from their browsers. This provides information about the interactions and experiences actual visitors are having on your website. As a result, it can assist in identifying problems that synthetic monitoring was unable to detect. Also, it can give you complete visibility into the performance of your website throughout the web.

Conclusion

A website may fall offline due to a number of reasons, including server maintenance, DNS issues, or malicious requests from hackers. As a website owner, you must optimize your website with the help of looking at its uptime. Long periods of downtime on your website can lead to security flaws, traffic declines, or income losses.

Fortunately, there are many tools available in order to determine whether a website is down or not. These tools need the website domain and some other information; after entering this information, you will be able to see the results of your website status a few times.

Sometimes website appears to be down on their network, which is why users cannot access your website. You must first conduct a search with the help of using one of the tools we suggest to determine whether or not your website is accessible globally.

The user's network is generating the problem if you find that the website is working normally. The user may need to clean their cache or resolve internet connection issues in this situation. For more accuracy, ensure that to test with different tools. It's critical that you should select a package from a reputable hosting company to avoid website downtime. All reputable hosting plans come with a 99.99% uptime guarantee.