How do you delete specific friends?

Using Facebook's custom privacy options

Updated on October 21, 2021

Table of Contents Show

Using Facebook's custom privacy options
What to Know
How to Hide Facebook Posts With the 'Friends Except' Setting
Wait, Want to Share the Posts?
About This Article
Is this article up to date?
How do I delete certain Friends?
How do I delete a specific friend on Facebook?
How do I remove the specific Friends option in the audience selector dropdown?
Can you delete Friends on Facebook without them knowing?

What to Know

Select What's on your mind to open a new Facebook post window. Choose the Privacy drop-down menu under your name.
Select Friends Except. Choose the name of a friend (or friends) to exclude them from seeing the post.
Choose Save Changes. Write your post as usual and select Post.

This article explains how to hide specific Facebook posts from specific people using the Privacy drop-down menu. It also includes information on how to share a post with only a handful of specific friends.

How to Hide Facebook Posts With the 'Friends Except' Setting

Every time you share a post on Facebook, you have the option to share it with the public, with only your friends, or with a more narrow group of people. If you don't change the setting every time, it defaults to the one you used most recently.

Here's how to exclude a specific person (or people) from seeing your Facebook post.

Select the What's on your mind field to open the Create Post window.
Click the Privacy drop-down list next to your name and profile image. It will display the most recent option you've used, such as Public or Friends.
In the Select Privacy list, choose Friends Except.
Select the name of the friend or friends you want to exclude from seeing your post. The name or names will appear in the Friends Who Won't See Your Post box at the bottom of the window.
To search for someone, begin typing their first or last name into the Search for a friend or list field and select the name when it appears.
Select Save Changes. You will see that the Privacy setting now says Friends Except.
Write your post like you normally would, add a photo, video or any other content and select Post when you're done to make it official.

Facebook does not provide a way for people to know that you have prevented them from seeing a post.

Alternatively, if you only want to share a post with a handful of friends, select Specific Friends in the Select Privacy list and choose the people you want to view the post. Everyone else will automatically be excluded from seeing it.

You may have prevented your mom from seeing what you posted, but don't forget about Aunt Myrtle. She could rat you out for saying something stupid on Facebook. Keeping up with who can see what can be tricky, and one slip up might cost you a friendship or get you knocked off the Christmas card list, or even worse, the Christmas gift list. Be careful out there.

Want to do the opposite and share the posts? Learn how to make Facebook posts shareable.

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Facebook has become so commonplace that virtually everyone you encounter has a profile. How many times have you met someone and spent a brief time chatting, only to find yourself Facebook friends the following day. All of this "over-friending" can lead to a jam-packed friends list full of people you barely know, making it difficult to find your actual friends. Facebook recommends "unfriending" by going to a person's profile, but you can mass remove friends by using the Edit Friends menu.

Log into your Facebook account.
Click the "Account" link in the upper right corner of your homepage, then click "Edit Friends" from the drop-down menu.
Locate the friends you want to remove either by scrolling or by typing a name into the search field.
Click the "X" next to a friend's name and then click "Remove Friend" to remove the friend. You can remove as many friends as you like on the Edit Friends page.

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If you’ve had a Facebook account for a long time, you might have a lot of people on your friends list who you don’t really know anymore. Although there's no way to mass delete multiple Facebook friends in a single click or tap, there are still ways you can quickly remove lots of friends. Read on to learn the fastest way to unfriend multiple people on Facebook!

Don't worry, you won't have to go to each friend's profile to remove them. You can easily remove multiple friends by clicking or tapping a few buttons on your Friends page. Your friends won't be notified that you've removed them, but if they visit your profile, they will see that you're not friends.
- If you're using Facebook on a computer, go to your profile and click the Friends tab at the top of the page. On the Facebook mobile app, just tap three horizontal lines labeled Menu, tap Friends, and select All Friends at the top. This displays your friends list with the people you communicate with most frequently at the top.
- To remove someone from the list, just click or tap the three horizontal dots next to their name, select Unfriend, and then choose Confirm.
- Repeat for all friends you want to remove.

If you don't mind keeping lots of friends but don't want them all to see what you post, you can add people to your Restricted list.[1] This means that even if you choose to make your posts viewable to Friends, those on your Restricted list will not see them—they'll only see the posts you mark as Public. All friends who aren't on your Restricted list will see your content as normal. Nobody on your Restricted list will know you've added them, and you can still chat with them and comment on their posts.
- On a computer, click the down-arrow at the top-right, select Settings & Privacy, and then choose Settings. Click the Blocking tab on the left, and then click Edit List at the upper-right corner. Select Friends from the drop-down menu, and then click all of the friends you want to add to the Restricted list. Click Finish to add them all at the same time.
- If you're using the mobile app, there's no way to quickly add multiple people to your Restricted list. It's best to use a computer.[2] However, you can add someone individually by visiting their profile. On their profile, tap the three dots at the top, tap Friends, select Edit Friend List, and then tap Restricted.

If you don’t want to remove certain friends but don't care to see their posts in your feed, you can unfollow them. Unfollowing someone doesn't remove them from your friends list (or vice-versa), so the people you've unfollowed will never know.
- On a computer, go to your Facebook profile and click the Friends tab at the top of the page. In the mobile app, tap three horizontal lines labeled Menu, select Friends, and tap All Friends.
- Click or tap the three dots next to a person you want to unfollow, then choose Unfollow. This immediately unfollows the person—no confirmation necessary.
- If you want to follow someone again in the future, just head over to their profile, select Friends at the top, and then click or tap Follow.

If you don't want people to see who you're friends with, you can easily hide your friends list from your profile. When you hide your friends list, friends can only see which friends you have in common, not your entire list.
- On a computer, click the down-arrow at the top-right corner, select Settings & Privacy, and then click Settings. Click the Privacy tab on the left, click Edit next to "Who can see your friends list?" and select Only me.
- In the mobile app, tap the three-line menu, select Settings & Privacy, and then tap Settings. Scroll down to the "Audience and Visibility" section, tap How People Find and Contact You, select Who can see your friends list? and then select Only me.

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Question
How do I delete all my current friends on Facebook?

This answer was written by one of our trained team of researchers who validated it for accuracy and comprehensiveness.

wikiHow Staff Editor
Staff Answer

Use the Friend Remover browser extension, then hit "select all." That will select all of your friends on Facebook, and then you can hit "Remove Friends."
Question
How can I block people from my Facebook account?

Go to their Timeline. Click the button with 3 dots on it and click Block to block them. Or go to Settings. click Blocking and type the name of the person you want to block on the block users list.
Question
Does an unfriended person know that they have been unfriended?

Not unless they go on your profile, where it will indicate that you two are no longer friends.

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While there are browser extensions that claim to be able to remove many Facebook friends at once, none of them have good reviews, and most require you to give full access to your Facebook account—not the safest option!
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Once you unfriend someone, there is no way to undo the action without re-friending them.
As a small thank you, we’d like to offer you a $30 gift card (valid at GoNift.com). Use it to try out great new products and services nationwide without paying full price—wine, food delivery, clothing and more. Enjoy!

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About This Article

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Is this article up to date?

How do I delete certain Friends?

Go to your friend's profile. Tap below their profile picture. Select Edit Friend List. Tap any lists you want to add the friend to, or tap a list with a next to it to remove them from the list.

How do I delete a specific friend on Facebook?

In the left menu of your Feed, click Friends. You may need to click See More first. Click Custom Lists and then click the list you want to delete. Click in the top right and select Delete List.

Creating and Managing Lists When looking at a friend, tap on the Friends button, and you'll see the 'Edit Friend Lists” option in the menu. Tap this, and you'll be able to choose the lists to add or remove them from by checking the list.

Can you delete Friends on Facebook without them knowing?

Can someone tell if you unfriend them on Facebook? A person does not receive any type of notification if you unfriend them on Facebook; you will just be removed from that person's friend list. If that person looks at their list of friends, they may notice that you are not in it anymore.