English Reference
Noun

outage

n. countable
B2 Upper Intermediate US /ˈaʊtədʒ/ UK /ˈaʊtɪdʒ/ out·age UK spelling outages

n.a period of time when a service is not working. This usually refers to things like electricity, the internet, or water.

n.a period during which a power supply or other public service is unavailable. Refers to a temporary suspension of utility or network operations.


SIMPLE

The storm caused a major power outage in our neighborhood.

CONTEXTUAL

The bank apologized for the website outage that prevented customers from accessing their accounts all morning.

COMPLEX

Engineers worked through the night to identify the software bug responsible for the global server outage that disrupted international communications for several hours.

Usage

Often paired with descriptive nouns like 'power', 'internet', or 'network'.

Organisers hope to screen more Sudanese films, but they say power outages remain a major challenge.

Al Jazeera· 22 Aug 2026

The paper writes that the outage had "no impact on the UK's wider power supply".

BBC News· 22 Aug 2026

From out + -age, on the model of shortage.

Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

This entry
Level B2 · Upper Intermediate
Frequency Frequent
Updated