Is Janitor AI Down? How to Check and Fix Errors

Short answer: to check whether Janitor AI is down, open its official status page at status.janitorai.com, which Janitor AI's own help centre points to. On October 7, 2026 at 16:58 UTC it showed All Systems Operational for both Backend and Frontend, with no reports in the previous 7 days.

If the status page is green and you still have problems, the fault is usually on your side, in your login session, or in your proxy and model provider. This guide shows how to tell those cases apart, using Janitor AI's own error articles, and how to fix each one.

How to check if Janitor AI is down

Work through these checks in order. They take about two minutes.

1. Official status page. Janitor AI's help centre says to check the status page at status.janitorai.com when you are unsure. It lists Backend and Frontend components and any recorded events. The page is hosted on openstatus.dev.
2. Another device or network. Try your phone on mobile data. If it works there, the problem is your browser or home connection.
3. A private window. This rules out extensions and a stale cache.
4. A different browser. Janitor AI's guides suggest Chrome, Firefox, Opera, Brave or Edge.

Third-party "is it down" sites exist, but the official page is the one the operator updates. Note that the status page does not publish a public JSON feed that we could find. The summary.json and current.json addresses some guides mention returned 404 when we tested them, so do not build a script around them.

What the status page does not tell you

The page shows component health and incidents. It does not show queue length, and it cannot tell you whether your own model provider is working. If you use a proxy, DeepSeek, OpenRouter or another provider can fail while Janitor AI is perfectly healthy.

A quick way to separate the two: switch to Janitor AI's built-in model for one message. Janitor AI's rate limit and network error guide uses the same test. If the built-in model answers, the site is fine and the problem is the proxy server. The guide says such problems are often temporary and suggests waiting before checking again.

Site errors versus proxy errors

The same number can mean different things depending on where it comes from. A site error comes from Janitor AI itself. A proxy error comes from the model provider you configured. Check which you have before you act.

Error	If it comes from Janitor AI	If it comes from your proxy
401	Login session or token problem. Log out and in, try a private window, clear cookies, then try another browser	Wrong or missing API key. Re-enter the key with no spaces
403	Content filter on a comment or review, or a Cloudflare or network problem at login	Key lacks permission. Check the provider's account settings
404	Page or chat missing	Wrong proxy URL or model name
429	Rare	Provider rate limit. Wait or switch model
502	The chat system has a temporary problem. Wait a few minutes	The model or host returned an invalid response
Network error	Connection or browser problem	Wrong proxy URL, or provider outage

The site-side rows follow Janitor AI's articles on 401 Unauthorized, 403 and 502. For 502 the guide says plainly that it is a temporary server-side issue and there is nothing you need to do. For 403 it says there is no direct fix beyond waiting or rewording your input. Login failures with the message "An invalid response was received from the upstream server" usually come from a temporary outage in the authentication service, most often with Gmail sign-in, and resolve by waiting and retrying.

Fix a proxy that fails while the site is up

1. Check that the key, URL and model all belong to one provider. A DeepSeek key with another host's URL fails.
2. Confirm the configuration shows Active, click Save Settings, refresh the whole page, then click Test, as Janitor AI's OpenRouter error guide recommends.
3. Test the key outside Janitor AI. Our DeepSeek proxy URL guide includes a curl command for this.
4. Check your provider's own status page. DeepSeek publishes one at status.deepseek.com.
5. Read the error against the provider's list. DeepSeek's error code page explains 401 (wrong key), 402 (empty balance), 429 (rate limit), 500 (server error) and 503 (overloaded).

For DeepSeek the URL is https://api.deepseek.com/chat/completions and the model is deepseek-flash. The full setup is in how to set up DeepSeek on Janitor AI.

One warning about older advice. Janitor AI's page on DeepSeek via OpenRouter still lists model names such as deepseek/deepseek-chat-v3-0324:free, and its page was last updated in July 2025. OpenRouter's public model list on October 7, 2026 contained no DeepSeek model with a :free suffix, so a 404 or "No endpoints found" error usually means the model name is retired.

Slow replies and queues

Slowness can come from site load, a slow model, or a very long context. Long chat history means more tokens per request and slower answers. Shorten memory notes and trim old messages before blaming an outage. Janitor AI's memory guide shows a compact format. If you use DeepSeek, thinking mode also adds a pause before the visible answer, because the model writes its reasoning first.

When a VPN helps and when it does not

Janitor AI's own error articles suggest turning a VPN off if you use one and trying one if you do not, as a last step for 401 and network errors. Treat that as an experiment, not a fix to leave on: a VPN changes your IP address, and some providers restrict certain regions. Never enter an API key or password on a site you reached through an unknown free proxy.

Checklist

1. Status page first.
2. Test another device or a private window.
3. Read the exact error text and decide: site or proxy.
4. Switch to the built-in model to isolate the cause.
5. Verify key, URL and model with one provider.
6. Keep a second saved configuration ready.

Sources

Janitor AI status page, Janitor AI: FAQ unsure if the site is down, Janitor AI: Rate Limit/Network Error, Janitor AI: 401 Unauthorized, Janitor AI: Error 403, Janitor AI: Error 502, Janitor AI: OpenRouter Error Guide, DeepSeek: Error Codes, DeepSeek status.