Facebook has plenty of hidden or unknown features, which can help you do all sorts of things. Learn the tricks of the world’s most popular social network.
1. “Other” messages
Not many people know that in an attempt to prevent spam, Facebook filters the messages that its users receive. They’re sorted into either the “Inbox”, which will be the folder you are used to seeing, or the “Other” folder, similar to the “Junk” or “Spam” folder in your email client. It is not a perfect system and messages received from someone you are not friends with will sometimes be sorted here, so you may be missing out on messages from long lost friends. However, you should be careful when looking through, as a lot of the messages are probably spam.
To access the “Other” folder, click “Messages” from your Facebook homepage on your computer. Now click “Other”, located in the top left next to the Inbox title.
2. Video and audio calling
You can use Facebook’s messaging service to call people or even video chat with them. To do this, simply click on the video camera icon or the telephone icon, located in the top right hand corner of a chat window. Depending on the device you’re using to access, Facebook video calling may not be available.
Learn more on Facebook’s website.
3. See who’s logged in to your account
If you suspect that someone is accessing your account without your permission, or you think that you’ve left yourself logged in on another computer, this feature will help you. “Where you’re logged in” will show every device which you’re logged in on, and allow you to end sessions which you do not recognise, it will also show you where the sessions are located, which makes it easy to identify unauthorised access. To access this feature, click the drop-down arrow at the top right of Facebook, then click “Settings”. Now click “Security” and finally click “Where you’re logged in”, at the bottom of the list. Alternatively, you can try clicking here.
4. Funny language settings
This last feature may be a bit less useful than the others, but it’s still fun. You probably know that you can change Facebook’s default language settings, but did you know that you can change it to Pirate English or Upside Down English? To do this, click the dropdown arrow at the top right of Facebook, then click “Settings”, now click on the “Language” section, under “General Account Settings”, or try clicking this link to take you there. Your language will likely be set English (UK) by default.
Choosing one of these alternatives will change text around the website, for example, “What’s on your mind?” will be changed to “What be troublin’ ye?” or written upside down.
If you ever want to change your language back, the “Settings” button will be found in the same place, but may now be called “Adjust ye riggin’s”, arr!
