Do you want to see if your friends have been on Facebook recently? Or, do you want to stop other Facebook users from knowing when you were last active on Facebook?
Facebook makes it pretty easy to manage your activity status and view other users activity.
This tutorial will show you how to tell when someone was last active on Facebook and then show you how to prevent others from determining when you were last active on Facebook.
How to View When Someone Was Last Active on Facebook
You and your friends last active status will appear in various areas of Facebook. Whether youre using an application or youre using a web browser, you can navigate to Messenger to find out when another user was last active.
To find the online status of another user on an iPhone or Android you can:
- Open Facebook Messenger.
- Check the round profile pictures at the top and swipe to the right to uncover more.
- Each person whos currently active on Facebook will have a green dot next to their name.
- Anyone who was recently active will have the time rather than a green dot.
If youre not using Facebook Messenger, you can see whos currently online with the Facebook app:
- Navigate to your News Feed within the Facebook app.
- Look at the top under Whats on your mind?
- Each online friend will have a round profile icon with a little green dot.
The same goes for the web browser. From the Facebook website, navigate to the same place and your friends who are online will have the green dot. Unfortunately, this only shows whos online right now, not the last active status.
You can also see the activity status of friends by following these steps:
- Visit the News Feed page and click on Contacts located on the right-hand side.
- Search for the green dot by each name indicating theyre active or have been recently.
Who Can See My Activity Status?
Unless youve turned your activity status off, which well discuss in a moment, anyone who is your friend on Facebook can see this status. If youve blocked someone, blocked someones messages in Messenger, or you arent friends with another person, they wont be able to see your activity status even if its turned on.
Hiding Your Status on Facebook
To help protect your Facebook privacy, there is absolutely nothing wrong with hiding your last active status. In fact, it can be quite liberating if you have friends who always think when youre online you should be at their beck and call.
From the Facebook app:
- Select the People tab and select Active at the top.
- Toggle off the slider next to your name.
From the Facebook Messenger app:
- Open the Facebook Messenger app and select your profile icon.
- Select Availability under your image and toggle it to off.
If you prefer to use Messenger Lite as I do, the process is similar:
- Select the cog settings icon.
- Select Active Status.
- Toggle it to Off.
You can do this from your desktop by following these steps:
- Open Facebook in a browser.
- Select the small grey cog icon at the bottom of the chat slider on the right.
- Select Turn Off Active Status.
If you use all three of these apps, you will have to adjust your settings on each app individually.
Hide Facebook Status with AdBlock Plus
If you use a browser for most of your Facebook activity, there are a bunch of extensions you can use that can hide your online status. You can also use Adblock Plus [ABP] to block it.
- Select Options within ABP.
- Select Start Writing My Filter List in the center pane.
- Add //*-edge-chat.facebook.com to the list and select Save.
The downside of turning off status on Facebook is that you wont be able to see other peoples status either.
Final Thoughts
By following the steps outlined above, you can easily view other peoples activity status and manage your own activity settings.
Do you have any other useful Facebook tips? Share them with us below!