Facebook introduces tool to control what you see & share in News Feed

To give users control over the content surfacing in their News Feed, and who can interact with the posts they share, Facebook has launched a few features and tools.

A new tool will give users more control over what they share to News Feed by managing who can comment on the public posts on Facebook. Now, users can control the commenting audience for a given public post by choosing from a menu of options ranging from anyone who can see the post to only the people and Pages the user tags.

Control What You Share

By adjusting the commenting audience, users can further control how they want to invite conversation onto their public posts and limit potentially unwanted interactions. Public figures, creators, or brands too can choose to limit their commenting audience on the public posts.

Control What You See

Facebook recently launched Favorites, a new tool where users can control and prioritize posts from the friends and Pages they care about most in News Feed. By selecting up to 30 friends and Pages to include in Favorites, their posts will appear higher in ranked News Feed and can also be viewed as a separate filter. People who use Favorites frequently can access it from the Feed Filter Bar, a new menu at the top of News Feed. 

The Feed Filter Bar offers easier access to Most Recent too, making it simpler to switch between an algorithmically-ranked News Feed and a feed sorted chronologically with the newest posts first. Android app users can access the Feed Filter Bar when they scroll up on News Feed. The same functionality will be available in the iOS app in the coming weeks. Regardless of how often users use them, they can find Most Recent and Favorites in the Shortcuts menu. 

These are the latest additions to the existing controls suite designed to control what you see in News Feed, including tools such as Snooze (where you can temporarily hide posts from a person, Page, or group) and the ability to turn off political ads. 

Also Read: Facebook expands brand safety controls and upgrades Commerce & Ads IP tool

Understand Why You See Suggested Posts in News Feed

Facebook is providing more context around the content they suggest in News Feed by expanding  “Why am I seeing this?.” This means that users will be able to tap on posts from the friends, Pages, and Groups they follow as well as some of the posts suggested to them and get more context on why they’re appearing in the News Feed. 

Facebook claims several factors influence suggested posts in News Feed such as:

• Related engagement: A post may be suggested for a user if other people who interacted with the post also previously interacted with the same group, Page, or post
• Related topics: If users have recently engaged with a certain topic on Facebook, they may suggest other posts that are related to that topic. For example, if they recently liked or commented on a post from a basketball Page, Facebook could suggest other posts about basketball
• Location: Users may see a suggested post based on where they are and what people near them are interacting with on Facebook

To update what you want to see and how you share to your News Feed, check out your News Feed preferences and privacy settings in the app and adjust them.