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Facebook Fights Back Against Myth That News Feed is Limited to 26 Friends

Facebook has come out swinging against those perpetuating a myth that its news feed displays a limited amount of content.

A persistent meme keeps popping up which has forced Facebook to respond and debunk false claims.

The meme claims that Facebook has a limit on the number of people who show up in the news feed.

Usually, the number is said to be around 25 or 26 friends.

People are copying and pasting the meme, in the form of a block of text, in an attempt to bypass a limit that doesn’t exist.

The meme encourages people to leave a comment on the post in order to show up in the other person’s news feed more often.

Facebook is advising users to stop spreading the meme because there is no actual limit on the number of people who show up in someone’s news feed.

The meme usually goes something like this:

“News feed recently shows only posts from the same few people, about 25, repeatedly the same, because facebook has a new algorithm.

Their system chooses the people to read Your post. However, I would like to choose for myself, Therefore, I ask you a favor: if you read this message leave me a quick comment, a “hello”, a sticker, whatever you want, so you will appear in my news feed.

Don’t just “Like”, Facebook requires a “Comment”. Even one word! Thanks!!!

Otherwise Facebook chooses who to show me and instead I don’t need facebook to choose my friends!”

Facebook wants to clear things up and stop the false claims from spreading further.

Facebook’s News Feed Has No Limit

A Facebook product manager in charge of rankings released the following statement:

“The idea that News Feed only shows you posts from a set number of friends is a myth…

If we somehow blocked you from seeing content from everyone but a small set of your friends, odds are you wouldn’t return.”

People may be led to believe this myth because the news feed is algorithmically generated.

It prioritizes posts from people, pages, or groups that a person interacts with most frequently.

So, if you engage with a limited number of people, chances are you’ll see them more often in your news feed compared to others.

However, you can always scroll down further to see posts from a wider group of people.

If you want to make sure you see everything from a certain person or page, you can use the ‘See First’ feature to put them at the top of your feed.

The company says it’s continuing to build new ways for people to control what they see on Facebook.

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SEJ STAFF Matt G. Southern Senior News Writer at Search Engine Journal

Matt G. Southern, Senior News Writer, has been with Search Engine Journal since 2013. With a bachelor’s degree in communications, ...

Facebook Fights Back Against Myth That News Feed is Limited to 26 Friends

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