How to Check if a Website Is Up & Running

Third-party sites can be used to check if other websites are up and running.

Browsing the World Wide Web can be a frustrating experience when the websites you want to visit are unreachable. Of course, all websites have at least some scheduled downtime, for example to upgrade their hardware or software. But they also have unscheduled downtime, for reasons ranging from a simple DNS routing error to a complete server meltdown. In some cases, a website may even work fine for some users while not working for others. That's why websites such as CheckSite, IsThatSiteDown, DownForEveryoneOrJustMe and DownOrNot allow you to check whether a website is truly unreachable, or just unreachable for you.

Things You'll Need

• Web browser

Instructions

1. Enter the address of CheckSite, IsThatSiteDown, DownForEveryoneOrJustMe or DownOrNot (see Resources) into your browser's address bar and press enter. Each of these websites will query a third website for you to determine whether that website is up and running.

2. Enter the address of the site you want to check into the address field on the third-party website and press enter. This will query the website to determine if it's reachable.

3. Wait for the query to complete. Note that this can take anywhere from a few seconds to half a minute, as queries are sent from multiple locations around the world in order to accurately determine whether a particular website is really unreachable for everyone. Once the query has finished, the page will display the results.

References

• Lifehacker: Check Web Site Availability with Down For Everyone Or Just Me?

Resources

• CheckSite: Site Check
• IsThatSiteDown: Site Checker
• DownForEveryoneOrJustMe
• DownOrNot: Is that site down or not? Get the definite answer