Ticketmaster has crashed during a massive pre-sale for Taylor Swift’s upcoming North American tour, leaving frustrated fans without tickets.

Hundreds of thousands of ‘verified’ Swifties logged onto the ticket merchant’s site on Wednesday morning (Australian time) for a scheduled pre-sale event for her 2023 The Eras tour.

The sale was meant to kick off at 5am (AEDT). But minutes before it had even officially begun, the Ticketmaster site crashed, leaving many Swifties in the lurch.

With Swift’s team having already anticipated a mammoth demand for tickets, dedicated Swifties were able to gain access to Wednesday’s special pre-sale by entering a pre-sale lottery.

Successful fans were meant to be given a special code, offering entry to Ticketmaster’s waiting room.

But instead, many reported not receiving codes in time for the sale, and many of those who did said their codes did not work.

Others said that Ticketmaster’s site had either frozen, would not let them gain access, or had crashed altogether.

Many documented their stressful experience online, with Swiftie YouTuber Lauren Lipman among the frustrated fans.

“I am so stressed right now. Like, do I hit refresh or does that ruin my spot in line?” Lipman said in her Instagram stories.

Some fans reported being in queues for up to six hours, only to be booted out and sent to the back of the line once reaching the checkout.

“When Taylor Swift wrote The Great War she was actually preparing us for the Battle of Ticketmaster,” another fan joked on Twitter.

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After Swifties demanded answers from Ticketmaster, the ticket merchant eventually released an update.

“There has been historically unprecedented demand with millions showing up to buy tickets for the TaylorSwiftTix presale,” it said in a Twitter statement.

“Hundreds of thousands of tickets have been sold. If you have already secured tickets, you are all set.”

Ticketmaster also asked Swifties to stay in queue – and informed them that the presale for the US West Coast had been pushed back two hours.

The difficulties prompted Swifties to share ‘tips’ for securing tickets.

Some decided to inspect Ticketmaster’s source code on Google Chrome. It showed how many thousands were ahead of them in the queue, and approximately how long they would need to wait.

Swift herself hinted that the fiasco was weighing on her mind, as she shared her excitement over her Grammy nomination, which was announced on Wednesday morning.

“So many reasons to lose my damn mind today,” she said in an Instagram story, before acknowledging her Song of the Year nomination for All Too Well (10 Minute Version) (Taylor’s Version).

One Twitter user perhaps summed up the disaster best.

“Be gentle with the Taylor Swift fans in your life tonight. They’ve had a hard day,” said writer Brian Mansfield.

Taylor Swift will play 52 concerts across North America in her The Eras stadium tour. It is anticipated to be the biggest tour of her career – she has described it as a “journey through all of my musical eras of my career”.

It will also feature special guests, including Paramore, Gayle, Phoebe Bridgers and HAIM.

Sadly for fans Down Under, Swift is yet to announce any international tour dates outside of the US.

Stateside, some cunning hawks have already been spotted reselling the pre-sale tickets for various dates for as much as $US33,000 ($48,900).

Since Swift last toured in 2018, the 11-time Grammy winner has released three new albums – folklore, evermore and Midnights, which was released to critical acclaim last month.

Swift has also been busy re-recording her albums following a bitter falling out with her former label over the ownership of her masters. She released re-recorded versions of hit albums Red and Fearless in 2021.

‘Easter egg’ clues in her music video for her Midnights track Bejeweled revealed that Swift’s 2010 album Speak Now looks likely to get the re-recording treatment next.