How to Make Your Facebook Private & Protect Your Privacy

By Andrew Collins | Last updated: Feb 19, 2024

AnyVid - Best Video downloader

4.9 out of 5

  • for Windows 10/8/7
  • for Mac OS X 14+
  • for Android

AnyVid - Best Video downloader

4.9 out of 5

How to Make Your Facebook Private

As one of the most popular social networking sites, Facebook has more than 1.6 billion daily active users. On Facebook, you will make friends of all kinds: your middle school classmates, friend’s friend, and even the person who used to live in the same neighborhood.

In fact, Facebook is based on a vast amount of data from users. It has a long personal information list for you to fill out, including your hometown, education experience, work experience, and so on.

It’s risky to expose too much personal information on the Internet. Hence, this powerful social network indeed offers privacy settings to protect your personal information from the public.

However, not too many people know how to make your Facebook private.

In this article, I will focus on how to make everything private on Facebook, including FB profile, page, photos, friend list, etc. ( Click here to donwload private video from Facebook)

It’s easier than you thought!

Part 1. How to Make Your Facebook Profile Private?

Generally, we can limit access to our personal information by Facebook’s privacy settings.

The entry to privacy settings locates on your Facebook home page. Facebook offers a privacy check at the beginning of the settings since there are so many items that you can make changes to. You can run the privacy check to find which part you want to make private simply.

How to Make Facebook Private on Computer

  1. Visit the Facebook website, and you can find the “Settings & Privacy” in the menu by clicking the small triangle on the top right corner.Settings & Privacy
  2. Click “Privacy Checkup.”Privacy Checkup
  3. You will see the page displays 5 different topics. You can select the one you want to begin with. For example, let’s click on “Who Can See What You Share.”Facebook privacy topics
  4. You will see the list of settings you can adjust in this part. Click Continue to start.List of Settings
  5. Now you can make your Facebook profile private. For each item of your personal information, you can select audiences from Public, Friends of Friends, Friends, to Only me & Custom. If you want to make your Facebook private to non-friends, please select audiences between Friends and Only me. Make your Facebook profile private
  6. You can move forwards or backwards between different tabs. After you feel happy with your settings, click Review Another Topic.Make Facebook private with other topic

After you finish all the settings in these 5 topics, your account is shielded by basic privacy protection. If you still feel not secure enough, you can also hide your Facebook profile.

How to Make Facebook Private on Your Phone

Most of us use the Facebook app frequently on mobile phones.

However, how to make Facebook private on mobile?

In this part, I am going to show you how to make your Facebook private on your Android phone. Follow similar steps, and you can also make your Facebook private on your iPhone.

  1. Open the Facebook app on your phone, and log in to your account.Open the menu on your Facebook homepage
  2. Tap the menu icon, which has three short lines. Tap Privacy shortcuts. Tap Privacy Shortcuts
  3. You will see 5 tabs that enables you to manage your privacy and security settings on Facebook. Under the Privacy tab, the most important thing is starting with any topic.Make Facebook private on mobile phone
  4. Run through all the 5 tabs and make sure you are satisfied with these settings. Make everything private on Facebook app

How to Hide Facebook Profile

Besides making your Facebook private, you can even hide the profile. How to hide a Facebook profile? Here I will take an example of how to hide a Facebook profile on the web.

  1. On the Facebook website, click the triangle drop-down icon on the right side, then select “Settings & Privacy” > “Settings.”Go to Facebook Settings
  2. Choose “Profile and Tagging” from the left tab, and you can edit items for 3 sections – “Viewing and Sharing,” “Tagging,” “Reviewing.” Choose Only me or Off for each entry.Hide Facebook profile
  3. Go to “Location” on the left tab and hide your “Location History.”

On top of it, there are lots of privacy items that will make you invisible on Facebook. I am not going to illustrate it in detail. Test them out yourself.

Part 2. How to Make Your Facebook Page Private?

Many users are curious about how to make my Facebook page private. Here come the steps.

  1. On the Facebook website, click the first triangle drop-down menu at the left side, choose “Settings & Privacy,” and further select “Settings.”Go to Facebook Settings
  2. Click “Privacy” on the left section, and you can make your Facebook Page private with the options “Your Activity,” “How People Find and Contact You,” and “How You Get Message Requests.”Make Your Facebook Page Private
  3. With the “Your Activity” option, you can decide who can see your future post. Click Edit nearby, and you can choose from Friends, Friends except, Only me, Specific friends, etc., with the pull-down icon.
    • Besides that, you can limit your past posts. Facebook allows you to limit all of them in one go. After you limit the past posts, only your friends can see them. However, the one who was tagged in the post and their friends can also see the post. You can see your friends’ private photos and videos even if they make the post private. If you want your past posts more private, you might need to limit a specific post’s audience.
  4. Under the “How People Find and Contact You” item, you can hide your friends list and make yourself unsearchable on Facebook.
    • Click the Edit icon next to “Who can see your friends list?” and choose Only me to hide your friends list.
    • If you want to be unsearchable on Facebook, select “Only me” – for these 2 questions – “Who can look you up using the email address you provided?” & “Who can look you up using the phone number you provided?” Then hit the Edit icon next to the option “Do you want search engines outside of Facebook to link to your profile?” and uncheck the box underneath.Hide friends list & Be unsearchable on Facebook

Part 3. How to Hide Birthday on Facebook?

Many users wish to hide their birthday on Facebook but fail to find the tricks. Now let me show you the guide on how to hide your birthday on Facebook.

  1. On the Facebook website, go to your profile, click “Edit Profile,” and scroll down, and further choose “Edit Your About Info.”
  2. Hit “Contact and Basic info” on the left tab. Then you can find your birthday info at the bottom of this section.
  3. Click the small round icon next to your birthday info and choose Only me to hide your birthday on Facebook. You can also make your birthday private on Facebook with the options such as “Friends,” “Friends of Friends,” or “Custom.”Hide birthday on Facebook

Part 4. How to Make Your Friends List Private on Facebook?

Many users show their concerns about how to make Facebook friends private. Here I will offer 2 ways to hide the friends list on Facebook here.

First solution:

  1. Go to Facebook website > Settings & Privacy > Settings > Privacy.
  2. Scroll down and find the “Who can see your friends list” item. Click the Edit icon nearby and make your choice.Make friends list private on Facebook

Second solution:

  1. Go to your Facebook profile page, and click the Friends tab.
  2. Click the ellipsis icon next to “Find Friend” to Edit Privacy.Edit privacy on Facebook
  3. Select the audience that could view your Friend List.Make Your Friends List Private on Facebook

It is easy, right?

Part 5. How to Make Photos Private on Facebook?

Many of us get used to sharing photos on Facebook. Yet there are some pictures that we don’t want everyone to view. In such as case, you can hide photos on Facebook with only a few clicks.

  1. Go to your profile page. Click the Photos tab.
  2. Choose Albums.
  3. Click the top right corner of an album, then choose Edit Album. You can change who can view the album in this way. If you want to make the album private, just change the audience to Only Me.Make Photos Private on Facebook

With similar steps, you can also make your Facebook video private as well. If you want to download these private Facebook videos, you can go to AmoyShare Facebook video downloader, or turn to our latest guide on how to download private Facebook videos.

Please notice that you cannot change the audience of the Mobile Uploads album, Profile Photos album, and Cover Photos album. They are always public. But you can limit the audience for each photo in the album.

How to achieve it? Hit the photo to enlarge it. Then you can click the public icon next to the time stamp and select audience.

Part 6. How to Hide Active Status on Facebook Messenger?

If you don’t want your friends and contacts to know that you are active recently, you can turn the Activity Status off. That is a good way to hide your online status on Facebook Messenger.

Run the Facebook Messenger app, and tap your profile picture. Then you will see “Active Status.” Tap it and toggle off the icon next to “Show when you’re active.”

Besides that, you can make your Facebook Messenger private as well.

Go to Facebook Messenger app on your mobile phone, and tap your avatar. Scroll down, and you will find the “Privacy” option, press it. Then you can make your Facebook Messenger private by changing the default settings of Messenger Delivery, Secrete Conversations, Blocked Accounts, Story Audience and Muted Stories.

Part 7. How to Make a Private Event on Facebook?

It is for you to make a private event on Facebook.

  1. On the Facebook website, click the + icon and choose the Event option.
  2. Choose event type between “Online” and “In person.”
  3. Now you can fill out the event details. On the left section, you can choose who can see and join this event. If you want to make a Facebook event private, please select “Private,” “Public,” “Friends,” or “Group” instead of “Public.”Make a Private Event on Facebook

Many users have asked for tips on how do I change a Facebook event from private to public. It is a pity that Facebook does not allow us to make a private event public now. Therefore, you need to think twice before selecting the event participants.

Conclusion

Facebook provides users with detailed privacy options. You can make your profile, photos, activity status private and hide your birthday and friends list.

Following the steps above, I think you will learn how to make your Facebook private.

Test them out now!

Frequently Asked Questions

How to make Facebook completely private to non-friends?

Run the Privacy Checkup to limit your audience as Friends. For further settings, you can go to Settings, Your Activity to make your future and past posts only visible to Friends.For the photos, you can make albums only accessible to Friends. But for Mobile Uploads, Profile Photos, and Cover Photos, you need to change visibility for each one at a time.

How to hide a friends list on Facebook?

1. Run the Facebook app, click the three-line hamburger menu at the upper right corner.2. Scroll down and find Settings & Privacy, tap it, and find Privacy Shortcuts. Press it.3. Press See more privacy settings under the Privacy section. 4. Scroll down and find Who can see your friends list at the fourth from the bottom.5. Make decisions among Friends, Friends except…, Specific friends, Only me, and you can hide your friends list on Facebook now.

How to make your birthday private on Facebook?

1. Run the Facebook app, and click your avatar at the upper left corner.2. Click the three-dot icon next to Add to Story. Then further choose Edit profile.3. Scroll down and tap Edit Your About Info.4. Find Basic Info, and click the Edit icon next to it.5. Under Birthday, you will see blue text next to Audience is. Tap the blue text and select an option.6.Under Birth Year, repeat the steps. Now you have made your birthday private on Facebook.

How to be unsearchable on Facebook?

1. Go to Facebook website, Settings & Privacy, Settings, How People Find and Contact You.2. Click the Edit icon next to Do you want search engine outside of Facebook to link to your profile.3. Uncheck the box at the bottom, and after a while, your profile will become unsearchable.