A large-scale fault at Cloudflare has triggered the “Please unblock challenges.cloudflare.com to proceed” message for many U.S. users. On November 18, 2025, Cloudflare reported an internal service degradation after detecting a sudden spike in unusual traffic. The disruption caused elevated error rates and affected multiple major websites and services.
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What just happened?
- Early Tuesday morning (U.S. time), Cloudflare’s network experienced significant disruption, impacting its challenge-page and security verification systems. The message “Please unblock challenges.cloudflare.com to proceed” began appearing when users attempted to access protected sites.
- The issue stemmed from an “internal service degradation,” where traffic passing through Woodflare’s infrastructure did not route correctly.
- Several high-profile platforms (including major social media and AI-tool providers) reported intermittent outages or access problems.
- Cloudflare noted it had begun recovery efforts and that some services are returning to normal. However, it cautioned customers that “higher-than-normal error rates” may persist.
Why the “Please unblock challenges.cloudflare.com” message appears
That particular prompt is shown when the domain challenges.cloudflare.com—used by Cloudflare’s challenge/verification system—is either:
- blocked by a browser extension, network filter, or DNS configuration, or
- temporarily unavailable or degraded due to Cloudflare’s infrastructure problem.
When the challenge cannot be loaded, the visitor is unable to move past the verification step and sees that blocking message.
How to respond if you see the message
If you’re encountering “Please unblock challenges.cloudflare.com to proceed,” here are steps you can try:
- Clear your browser cache and cookies.
- Disable ad-block or script-block browser extensions temporarily; these can interfere with the challenge domain.
- Switch your DNS to a public one (for example, 1.1.1.1 or 8.8.8.8) in case your current DNS is filtering
challenges.cloudflare.com. - Try a different network (e.g., mobile data instead of Wi-Fi) to check if the issue is network-specific.
- If you operate a website and see visitors blocked, check your Cloudflare security/Firewall rules and ensure you haven’t inadvertently blocked the challenge domain.
The broader implications
- The outage highlights how reliant much of the internet is on a few key providers like Cloudflare for core services such as bot mitigation and human verification.
- When a challenge or verification layer fails, even if the website itself is fine, the visitor’s access effectively stops.
- For businesses and website operators, this incident underlines the need for contingency planning when a third-party infrastructure provider faces issues.
Current status and outlook
As of this writing, Cloudflare shows partial service recovery, including improved performance for its Access and WARP modules. Many U.S. users are now able to access sites previously blocked by the challenge message. However, Cloudflare continues to monitor error-rates and complete its full remediation. While most traffic has resumed normal flow, some customers still report access or verification delays.
If you’re still seeing “Please unblock challenges.cloudflare.com to proceed,” it may be a local filter or extension issue — but thanks to today’s outage, there’s also a good chance the problem lies with the underlying network provider. Let us know in the comments if you’re still blocked or which fix worked for you.
