How to check if a Website is actually down?

There are many reasons why a website might not open in your browser. They include:

  • The website being down
  • Your DNS not being able to lookup the IP address of the website
  • Settings in your browser blocking access to the website
  • Routers/Proxy servers redirecting traffic

The possiblity of error might seem to be larger on your side but its deeply frustrating to check every cause and eventually figure out that the problem was actually on the website’s side.  The simplest way to eliminate this possibility is to check the website through http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/

Fire up your browser and point it to http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/

Once there type the website to check, in the space provided and hit enter.

If the website is down you will get something like the following message:

Other wise you will get a message like this one:

In case of the latter, maybe its time to choose a better DNS provider or recheck your browser/router settings