UPI Massive Outage Sparks Meme Fest on X: Top Reactions

UPI, or the Unified Payments Interface, appears to be down, preventing bank account and credit card holders from making payments through their phones. According to the internet disruption watchdog Downdetector, outage reports spiked over 3,000 after 7:30 pm IST with an upward trend. Users have reported issues in making peer-to-peer and peer-to-merchant payments through apps such as BHIM, Google Pay, PhonePe, and Paytm , among others.

While Downdetector’s forum is full of complaints about disruptions in the UPI server, users took to X (formerly Twitter) to post their hilarious takes on the outage. Here are the top reactions handpicked from the social media platform as the outage continues to worsen.

Meanwhile, Reddit users have flooded different threads with workarounds, such as using the UPI Lite wallet for payments of up to ₹2,000. UPI Lite is a UPI-based wallet that works similarly to digital wallets on Paytm, allowing users to store up to ₹2,000 for low-value transactions to merchants.

Some users called for bringing back the cash system for situations like this, saying it is better to “carry some cash” in a wallet while shopping.

An email sent to the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) did not elicit a response at the time of publishing.

Launched in 2016, UPI emerged as a breakthrough technology for cashless payments as the internet penetration in India increased. According to NPCI’s report, UPI transactions hit a record high of 16.99 billion in February, accounting for a total value of ₹23.48 lakh crore.