SEVEN has blamed ‘unprecedented demand’ for technical issues plaguing the official Olympics app which ground to a halt numerous times over the weekend.

Due to stream 4000 hours of coverage throughout the Games, the app was hit with outages and technical glitches leaving many viewers unable to access content. The app struggled to cope under the weight of 4.1 million streams over the weekend. Many users have paid $19.95 to unlock premium content.

Users have taken to Twitter and review sites to express their frustration using phrases including “piece of crap”, “don’t bother” and “terrible” to describe it.

The 7 Olympics app currently has 1600 one star reviews on iTunes and more than 1900 one star reviews on Google Play.

Users report the app either failed to load, constantly crashed or that footage froze mid stream. Others reported navigation errors, meaning they couldn’t fast forward through catch up events, while others claim to have been forced to watch nine ads in a row before a stream loaded.

Seven’s online live streaming service Plus 7 also experienced technical problems.

Seven blames the issues on the app’s unexpected popularity and take-up with 2.8 million streams in the past 24 hours to Monday morning alone. That’s five times more than the number who streamed the Melbourne Cup last year.

Seven said that although the app features its branding it is actually provided by Olympic Broadcasting Services and its affiliates. Australian users weren’t the only ones hit by the technical glitches, with 13 countries affected around the world. A Seven spokesperson said technicians were working around the clock to fix the problems.

“We are aware of the technical issues which were caused by the unprecedented take up of the app,” the spokesperson said. “We have released a number of updates and our providers are working on each issue. We’re confident the issues are being address and expect a resolution pretty quickly.”

“The size of the audience and the take up of the app has been wonderful.”

The 7 Olympics app is really, really good at streaming ads but TERRIBLE at streaming the actual events. — Max Laughton (@maxlaughton) August 7, 2016

Amazing hearing so many problems with 7′s Olympics app. 4 YEARS ago Foxtel nailed it. No excuses. — Seamus Byrne (@seamus) August 6, 2016

@ArtSapphire @7olympics and don't bother paying. You still won't get to see it. The app will crash after you've seen an ad #7olympicsapp — Stuart (@hawkstew) August 8, 2016

Go to watch volleyball on Channel 7s Olympic App and it keeps crashing. I thought the Olympics were for the people? 7 only care about the 💰💰 — Jerome Ferre (@thatsjustjerome) August 7, 2016

Seriously watched 5 seconds of a stream only to have another 15sec ad to pop up and then the app crashed. The ' #Olympics on 7 ' app sucks — Damon Dawson (@Damon_DAWS0N) August 7, 2016

The Olympics on 7 app is, how do you say? A piece of crap. pic.twitter.com/sa5sOXza4r — Andrew (@egadheg) August 7, 2016