Private Relay Unavailable Due To A Technical Problem (Fix!)

Are you getting the iCloud Private Relay unavailable error? That’s because Apple’s premium privacy service is currently experiencing a worldwide downtime! Private Relay has been automatically deactivated for most users a couple of hours ago and a notification was issued on affected devices!

iCloud Private Relay Unavailable

• Open Settings and browse for Apple ID -> iCloud. Are you getting the Private Relay Unavailable status.
• Tap it and you will be further informed that:
  “Private Relay is temporarily unavailable due to a technical problem.”

Fact: The service will resume working automatically when the problem is solved.

iCloud Private Relay Outage

The problem is confirmed by Apple’s System Status page. (direct link)

The November 3 outage started at 2:40 pm EDT and is currently ongoing at the time of writing (7:40pm EDT). The Private Relay downtime is ongoing for over 5 hours.

Fact: It’s the first outage reported ever since Private Relay was released to the public on September 20.

Update, November 14 Private Relay is down again! Issue isn’t confirmed yet on Apple System Status page. However, we can confirm it based on our own experience and organic search traffic on this subject!

Update: The iCloud Private Relay service is back up and running! The outage lasted 7 hours and 34 minutes.

How To Fix iCloud Private Relay Unavailable

Obviously, there’s not too much that you can do to fix this Private Relay issue. Be patient until Apple brings the service back up.

ReEnable Private Relay

However, you might want to try to turn the service Off and back On to force your iPhone or iPad to reconnect to Apple’s servers.

How To:

• Browse for Settings -> Apple ID -> iCloud -> Private Relay (Beta).
• Use the toggle to disable Private Relay (Beta).
• Confirm your action by tapping Turn Off Private Relay in the popup that informs about the effects of your decision.
• Wait a couple of seconds and turn the service back On! Does it work?

Tip: If you still get the same Private Relay unavailable status, you might wanna keep Private Relay turned off to avoid any additional errors caused by the downtime, including the Unable to content to remote content privately in mail!

Fact: With Private Relay turned Off your IP address and browsing activity in Safari will no longer be hidden from websites and network providers and you will not be protected from unsecured connections in apps. However, all this isn’t available during the downtime anyway!

Are you also affected by this iCloud Private Relay Outage? Please confirm it in the comments section. Do mention your country or region. Thanks for the contribution.

Related: The Private Relay unavailable notification might be also generated if your Wi-Fi network isn’t able to connected to the Internet because of a temporarily downtime of your ISP (Internet Service Provider).