Vodafone customers in the UK have reported significant service disruptions affecting internet and mobile phone services. Many users began experiencing issues around 3 PM on a recent Monday, with the outage monitoring site Downdetector noting over 135,000 reports within 20 minutes. A majority of the complaints—more than two-thirds—were related to broadband services. Additionally, nearly 25% of issues were connected to mobile internet access, while around 8% of users reported being unable to make calls due to a lack of mobile signal. Some customers also experienced difficulties accessing the Vodafone app and website.
Reports of service issues have come from major cities including London, Birmingham, Cardiff, Glasgow, and Manchester. It has been confirmed that the outage affects only Vodafone customers in the UK and is not linked to a cyber-attack. A spokesperson for Vodafone acknowledged the disruption and stated they are working to resolve the network problems that are impacting broadband, 4G, and 5G services.
Vodafone has over 18 million customers in the UK and has been expanding its broadband services, with more than 700,000 fixed-line internet customers. In May, Vodafone merged its British operations with Three UK, creating the largest mobile provider in the UK with over 27 million subscribers; however, Three customers are not affected by the current outage.
Other telecom networks, including BT, which owns EE, and VirginMediaO2, have indicated their services are operating normally, with only a small number of outage reports being recorded for those networks.
Telecoms expert Sabrina Hoque of Uswitch.com pointed out that customers may have rights regarding compensation for prolonged outages, particularly under regulations enforced by the telecoms regulator, Ofcom. If a broadband service remains down for more than two days, users could potentially claim compensation for each day until service is restored.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/oct/13/vodafone-outage-broadband-mobile-down-internet-calls