Error 503 File Is Temporarily Not Available Please Try Again Later Reddit
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What is HTTP error 503 and how do you fix it?
It may not always be obvious what's causing the issue, but there are steps you can take to get back online
Whether surfing the web for entertainment or browsing online resources for a work report, an HTTP error page is often the last thing you need – especially if it's the dreaded 503.
Often confused with the 502 bad gateway, the 503 is an entirely separate HTTP error. Nonetheless, the two have at least one thing in common: it might be difficult to solve the mystery of what caused the issue, especially if you're not a qualified IT technician.
Most of the time, simply refreshing the page should resolve the issue. However, there may be instances when this easy fix might not be enough, and the error 503 simply won't go away. This can be especially stressful in situations that are time-sensitive, such as ahead of an important deadline. Therefore, instead of waiting for help to arrive, why not try taking matters into your own hands?
It's worth noting that it's very probable that the error 503 is nothing personal and might not have been caused by anything on your end. In fact, it's more likely to be linked to issues with the web server that your browser is trying to access when loading up the site, as opposed to having been caused by your PC or Wi-Fi network. In these cases, there is little to do other than seek professional IT help.
That being said, read on to find out more about the HTTP error 503 – what it means, what causes it, and what you can do to fix it.
What does HTTP error 503 mean?
In essence, the 503 error means something is stopping the browser from accessing a website server. This usually means the server has been unable to deal with the information requested, but what's causing that issue won't necessarily be clear. Often the only advice you can get for this error is the rather unhelpful 'try again later'.
The recent Fastly outage in June saw a number of sites display the 503 error message. This included payment websites PayPal and Shopify, internet forums Quora and Reddit, streaming sites Spotify, Twitch, Hulu, HBO Max, and Vimeo, and developer portals GitHub and Stack Overflow. This also affected gov.uk, as well as numerous online newspapers and news outlets, such as the New York Times, BBC, Financial Times, CNN, the Guardian, Bloomberg News, and The Verge, with the latter having to use Google Docs to publish stories.
While many of the websites showed the "503 error", the cloud computing services provider described the issue as a "global CDN disruption", with its own website displaying an "I/O error" message.
What causes an HTTP error 503?
When met with an HTTP error 503, the first question is usually "why?", coupled with the hope that determining the cause of the issue will help us solve it quickly and painlessly. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. Similarly to most HTTP errors, determining the root cause of the Error 503 is much harder than one would expect – especially without technical IT expertise.
However, there are a few possible scenarios that can be considered as plausible causes for an HTTP error 503. In the majority of cases, the 503 is triggered when the website in question is no longer able to connect with its supported server, meaning that any information requested or issued by your browser is simply hitting a wall. This usually happens when the server experiences a technical issue or is undergoing maintenance works which you might not always have been aware of. Frequent technical issues, such as those occurring multiple times a month, can be especially troublesome and have the potential to negatively impact a business – especially if it heavily depends on online traffic or orders made through e-commerce. Hence, if your website is displaying an HTTP error 503 more often than its own home page, it might be worth switching hosting providers.
Although an HTTP error 503 can diminish the number of customers visiting the site, it can also be caused by an inundation of visitors, such as during seasonal sales. In these cases, the server remains connected, yet is incapable of supporting the avalanche of requests from many different users. On the flip side, this can also be caused by malicious traffic instead of eager customers, such as in the case of distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. Misconfigured web apps may also cause a 503 error to appear, such as a plugin conflict caused by WordPress, while regular 503 errors could suggest an issue with the domain name system (DNS), whether that's an incorrect server configuration or an issue with the DNS server itself.
How to fix an HTTP error 503
The fastest method to resurrect the site you're trying to access is by refreshing the web page and hoping that this will solve the problem.
However, there are also several other steps you can take to make sure the problem isn't linked to your connection. For example, you can restart your router or computer. If an error message shows "Service Unavailable – DNS Failure", then this usually means there may be an error with your hardware configuration, which thankfully can be corrected by performing a reboot. You might find there is a problem with the allocated DNS server, but this is normally resolved by choosing to use a different DNS server.
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However, if the 503 error is a result of a problem found on the server's side, then unfortunately there isn't a lot you can do yourself to remedy it. This is where the IT administrator for the site should troubleshoot the issue to find a solution to the fault that users are reporting if they are encountering HTTP 503 errors. If you find yourself in that position and discover that updates need to be applied to a site, it's recommended to schedule them when your site's traffic is likely to be lowest, so your users don't regularly come across errors.
Alternatively, if recurring HTTP 503 errors are regularly caused by traffic spikes, it's best to use this as a sign that you might want to increase your web server resources investment. In addition to this, a surge of traffic could be the result of a denial of service (DoS) attack, in which case it might be a clever idea to approach your hosting provider to ask about the possible mitigations they can offer you to prevent attacks in the future.
Further investing in security protections or increasing the frequency of patch management could also serve to prevent any subsequent incidents from occurring. Several providers already include DDoS protection as part of their default packages, which may restrict the number of users that are allowed to access a site at any one time.
Finally, should the HTTP 503 error be a result of a programming bug, you'll need to undergo further investigation to pinpoint the issue and rectify it permanently.
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