An internet shutdown is a deliberate disruption of internet access or of specific services, ordered or carried out by a government, usually for a particular area and time. It can mean a complete blackout, a cut of mobile data only, or the throttling of a few platforms until they are unusable.

2025 set a new record for such shutdowns, and the first half of 2026 brought some of the longest and most repetitive ones yet. This article brings together the main public datasets, explains what each actually measures, and looks at a few examples, as of October 2026.

Three datasets, three different questions

The numbers you see quoted in the news often come from one of three sources. They count different things, so they don't always match.

  • Access Now and the #KeepItOn coalition count individual shutdowns ordered by authorities, including regional and platform-specific ones. It is a human-rights-focused tally.
  • Top10VPN, a VPN review website, estimates the economic cost of major government-imposed outages, using the NetBlocks COST tool and indicators from bodies such as the World Bank and ITU. Because it is a commercial VPN site, its figures are best read alongside independent sources.
  • Cloudflare Radar reports what Cloudflare's network observes: drops in traffic from a country or network. Its quarterly summaries cover both government action and other causes such as power cuts, cable damage and natural disasters.

Keep this in mind when comparing headlines: "313 shutdowns" and "212 major outages" can both be correct for the same year.

2025 in numbers

How many and where

According to Access Now's report published on 31 March 2026, there were at least 313 shutdowns in 52 countries in 2025, up from 304 in 2024 and the highest number the coalition has recorded. Access Now said that not a single day of 2025 passed without at least one shutdown somewhere in the world.

Myanmar had the most, at least 95, for the second year in a row. India, Pakistan, Russia and Iran were among the other countries listed. Seven countries appeared on the list for the first time, including Albania, Lithuania, Panama and the United States.

Why they happen

Access Now found that conflict was the leading trigger for the third year running: 125 shutdowns in 14 countries, about 40% of the total. Other recurring triggers include protests, elections and school exams.

A newer trend is the targeting of satellite internet. Access Now counted 14 shutdowns affecting satellite services across seven countries in 2025, up from four in 2024.

What they cost

Top10VPN estimated that government-imposed shutdowns cost the global economy $19.7 billion in 2025, 156% more than in 2024. It counted 212 major outages in 28 countries, adding up to 120,095 hours of disruption and affecting 798.12 million people.

By its estimate, Russia accounted for the largest share at $11.9 billion, followed by Venezuela ($1.91 billion) and Myanmar ($1.89 billion). For the situation in Russia, see our article on mobile internet shutdowns and whitelists.

Examples that show the range

Afghanistan: a nationwide collapse

On 29 September 2025, AP reported that internet connectivity in Afghanistan had "collapsed" to 14% of ordinary levels, citing the monitoring group NetBlocks. It was the first shutdown of its kind since the Taliban took power in August 2021. Earlier that month, after a decree by the Taliban's leader banning fiber-optic internet, several provinces had already lost their connections. The Taliban government did not confirm the blackout, according to AP.

Iran: 88 days offline

Cloudflare reported that a shutdown in Iran that began on 28 February 2026 showed signs of ending on 26 May, after 88 days. Traffic recovered only partly: Cloudflare said it reached about 40% of pre-outage levels the next day and later settled near 59%. Our explainer on Iran's 2026 internet shutdown covers the background.

Exam shutdowns: short, scheduled, repeated

Some shutdowns are aimed at preventing cheating in national exams. In the second quarter of 2026, Cloudflare observed:

  • Sudan: 10 exam-related shutdowns between 13 and 23 April 2026, each lasting about three and a half hours.
  • Iraq: three shutdowns, on 2, 11 and 28 June 2026, each about 90 minutes.

These are short, but they hit entire countries, including hospitals, businesses and families, not only students.

Not every outage is a shutdown

Cloudflare's same Q2 2026 summary is a useful reminder that many disruptions have nothing to do with governments. It describes a typhoon near Guam in April, two strong earthquakes in Venezuela on 24 June, a fiber cut affecting Saint Lucia on 21 June, a power outage in Tanzania, and a DNS error that briefly broke many .de domains on 5 May 2026.

So when your connection drops, a power or network problem is often the simpler explanation. Monitoring groups usually take some time to confirm whether an outage was ordered by authorities.

What it means for ordinary users

Shutdowns affect daily life in practical ways: payments, work, school, contact with family and access to emergency information. A few steps help regardless of where you live:

  • Have offline backups of important documents, contacts and maps on your phone.
  • Agree on a fallback with family, such as a phone call, SMS or a meeting point, in case messaging apps stop working.
  • Check information carefully. During and after shutdowns, rumours and fake news travel fast. Wait for confirmation from established outlets.
  • Avoid unknown apps that promise to restore access. They are a frequent source of malware; see our guide to fake VPN apps and their warning signs.
  • Know the local rules. Laws on network restrictions and on tools such as VPNs differ by country and change over time. Our article on whether using a VPN is legal explains what to check.

A VPN is a privacy tool that encrypts traffic between your device and a server; it cannot help when there is no internet connection at all. If you are new to the topic, start with What is a VPN?.

Key takeaways

  • Access Now counted at least 313 shutdowns in 52 countries in 2025, a record, with conflict the main trigger.
  • Top10VPN, a VPN review site, put the 2025 cost at $19.7 billion, with Russia the largest share.
  • In 2026, Iran experienced an 88-day shutdown and Sudan and Iraq cut access during national exams, according to Cloudflare.
  • Different datasets measure different things, so compare like with like.
  • Many outages are technical or caused by disasters; wait for confirmation before drawing conclusions.