Is your web site down? Maybe, maybe not.

Here’s a typical situation: you can’t connect to your web site. So, you contact your web hosting provider. They say that your site is up. You get annoyed that they can’t find “the problem”.

You could both be correct, sort of. Your web host may be correct that the site is up. You may be unable to reach it. Your inability to connect could be due to factors outside the control of your web host, and literally outside of their hosting network. It is common for clients to say that their site is down, when in fact it is up and connectable but there is a connection issue.

Every visit to a web site involves many separate steps and pieces of equipment. Normally everything happens quickly and seamlessly, so we don’t notice. If one of those steps fails though, then traffic may be unable to reach its destination.

Here are a few possible reasons why you might not reach your web site:

A local issue on your computer, modem or router.
An issue at your Internet Service Provider.
A routing issue or failure of equipment somewhere between your ISP and your web host. Such routing failures are common, and outside the control of your ISP and your web host.

How to test if your site is truly down

Before contacting support, first test if your site is truly down. Try an outside testing service such as “Down for everyone or just me?” That service will attempt to connect to your web site, and will report either that the site is down or that it is up and that the problem is just with your connection.

Another test you can use is Alerta Spot Check. Spot Check attempts to connect to your site from multiple geographic locations, and reports the results.

Next time you think your site is down, test it out first. If it isn’t, you won’t need to contact support. If it is, you can impress your host’s support with the results of your tests.