Verizon Outage Resolved, Company Promises Credits
Verizon announced that a January 14 service outage has been resolved after it stretched for nearly 10 hours across the U.S.
The wireless carrier said in statements on X late Wednesday that it "let many of our customers down" and promised to provide account credits to affected customers.
Verizon said a $20 credit could be redeemed "by logging into the myVerizon app," adding that customers will receive a text when the credit is available. They added,
This credit isn’t meant to make up for what happened. No credit really can. But it’s a way of acknowledging your time and showing that this matters to us.
This credit is meant to cover more than the cost of a day of service for most customers, but some Verizon customers feel let down by the amount of the credit.
What Happened
The outage began about 12:30 p.m. ET and resulted in more than 1.5 million Verizon customers reporting wireless and data outages, according to Downdetector. The real-time tracking website said reports surpassed those of a Verizon outage on August 30, 2025, which was one of the largest outages in 2025.
The event was widespread across the United States, with the highest reported concentrations in New York City, Atlanta, Charlotte, Houston and Brooklyn, according to Downdetector.
Verizon didn't disclose the scope of the disruption, though it said it didn't see any indication of a cyberattack.
The outage prompted several major cities to advise residents to use other carriers to call emergency services. That's not great when you're trying to reach 911 and your phone doesn't work.
"We understand how important reliable connectivity is and apologize for the inconvenience," the company said in an earlier statement on X.
Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr told Reuters after a congressional hearing Wednesday that the agency will review the outage "and take appropriate action."
The Bottom Line
This outage was bigger than the August 2025 outage that was already one of the largest of last year. That's not the trend Verizon wants.
Major cities had to tell residents to use other carriers to call emergency services. Imagine needing to call 911 and your phone just doesn't work because your carrier is down. That's the kind of outage that gets federal regulators interested.
Verizon says there’s no indication of a cyberattack. So, it was some kind of technical failure or system issue that knocked out service for millions of people across the country for most of a workday. New York City, Atlanta, Charlotte, Houston, Brooklyn saw the highest concentrations of reports. But the outage was nationwide, those cities just had the most people reporting problems.
Ten hours is a long time to be without wireless service in 2026. People rely on their phones for everything. Work, emergencies, staying in touch with family, navigation, payments. Losing all of that for half a day is more than an inconvenience.
For the 1.5 million customers affected, the outage's over but the frustration probably isn't. Credits help but don't make up for whatever you missed or couldn't do because your phone didn't work for 10 hours.
Verizon's had issues with outages before. This being the second major one in less than a year suggests underlying problems with their network infrastructure that need addressing beyond just fixing each individual outage as it happens.
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