How to Hide Last Seen on Facebook

With all of the misunderstandings involved with several types of privacy settings on social media apps, it can be challenging to know if your account shows that you are active or inactive. If you want your Facebook presence to remain incognito, there are a few simple rules to follow.

Read on to learn how to hide your last seen active status on Facebook. The process to do so is easy, but if you do not follow the steps correctly, you may not see the results you are looking for. If you want your activity to remain private, you must turn it off on all devices.

How to Hide Online Status on Facebook

For some reason, Facebook does not seem to have the most efficient way to turn off your last seen on Facebook. However, once you learn how and why this is, it makes sense that it can appear complex at first. Below are the steps you need to take to ensure that your activity status is hidden on Facebook.

Before getting right into it, you need to know that if you have Facebook and Facebook Messenger on multiple devices, you will have to turn off your last seen status on each device and each application. With that said, different devices - like a laptop vs. a smartphone - may have different setups.

As you probably already know, countless people - perhaps yourself included - worry about just how secure their private information is when it is shared via the internet. By continuing through this article, you will learn how to best protect yourself from unwanted interactions with other Facebook users, as well as ways that hiding your last seen status on Facebook can prevent third-party websites - and Facebook itself - from getting more information than you are willing to share.

Facebook Via Web Browser

Many Facebook users prefer to log on via a laptop or desktop computer. If this is your case, here is how to hide your activity status. Because Facebook Messenger is the outlet in which you can converse with mutual friends and new friend requests, it is where other Facebook users can see whether or not you are currently active on Facebook.

Locate the Facebook Messenger icon in the top right corner of your Facebook page in the browser. When you click on the icon, the Messenger feature will show a drop-down menu. At the top of the menu, you will see three dots. Click those dots, and then turn off your last seen status by clicking “Turn off Active Status.”

When you click “Turn off Active Status,” you will be given the option of hiding your activity presence from whomever you wish. If you want to prevent everyone from seeing your active status, click the option to do so. However, if you are okay with certain people seeing it, you can select whomever you would like.

If you only use a web browser on one specific computer, you are good to go. However, if you use Facebook on other devices, you have to turn off your activity status on those as well. If you use different computers - but still just use a web browser instead of an application - the activity status action should transfer over. Still, you might disengage it on your other computer(s) as well just in case it does not do so.

To recap, here is how to hide your last seen status on Facebook via web browser:

1. Click on the Messenger icon in the top right of your screen.
2. Locate and click the three dots at the top of the drop-down menu.
3. Turn off your last seen status by clicking “Turn Off Active Status.”
4. Choose who - if anyone - you would like to still be able to see your last seen status.
5. If you use Facebook in browsers on other computers, it is good to follow the above steps on each computer.

Facebook Via Facebook Mobile App

If you have the Facebook application installed on your smartphone, it is still an easy sequence to hide your activity status. Though, since you are not using a web browser, the setup of Facebook will look different than it does on a computer. Here is how to navigate Facebook on your mobile device to turn off your activity status.

The first thing you need to look for is an icon showing three horizontal lines on top of one another. If you have an iPhone, it will be at the bottom right of your screen. For androids, it is at the top right. After you tap on the three lines, scroll down to “Settings & Privacy,” and then click on “Settings.”

Once you are in “Settings,” scroll to the “Privacy” section and choose “Active Status.” After clicking on that, you can flip the switch to turn your active status off and prevent Facebook users from seeing your last seen status. Once you confirm that you want to turn this feature off, you are good to go.

Because a mobile device is somewhat restrictive compared to a computer, you cannot choose people to remain in the loop about your activity status. In the mobile app, you can only turn it off completely. If you want to allow a select number of people to see that you are active, you will have to do so in a browser.

Though there are a few more menus to navigate through, the process of hiding your last seen status on Facebook is still quite manageable:

1. Click the icon showing three horizontal lines.
2. Choose “Settings & Privacy.”
3. Scroll down to “Settings.”
4. Click “Settings” and find and choose “Active Status” in the “Privacy” section.

Facebook Messenger Via Mobile App

As stated before, most of the activity status in Facebook is monitored through the Facebook Messenger app. It is crucial that if the app is installed on your mobile device (which is common, because typically, when you download Facebook and create an account, Facebook recommends downloading the Messenger app), you turn off your activity status on there as well.

The process of turning off your last seen status on Facebook Messenger is much easier than the others. When you are in the app, locate your profile icon in the top left of your screen and click it. Find and click where it says, “Active Status” and turn off “Show when you’re active.” Once you have done this, confirm your decision in the pop-up window.

While it is not a complex process, you must make sure to turn off your active status on this app because it tracks your status when you are logged onto Facebook. Of course, you may not care if other people see your active status, but there is a large amount of speculation these days about how much privacy is reserved through social media.

As you now know, turning off the last seen status on Facebook Messenger is easy:

1. Click your profile in the top left of the screen.
2. Click “Active Status.”
3. Turn off “Show when you’re active.”
4. Confirm to turn off when prompted.

What Is the Significance of Hiding Your Last Seen on Facebook?

Now that you know how to turn off your activity status on Facebook, you might be wondering why doing so can be beneficial. And what is more, what does it mean when you turn off your last seen status? While it may not make you completely anonymous in every way, here is what it can do.

Below are a few broad examples of precisely what happens when you hide your last seen status on Facebook. While it may not grant you impenetrable browsing privileges, it can certainly make it more difficult for others to keep up with you.

Hiding Your Last Seen Status

If you have not figured it out by now, turning off your last seen status on Facebook quite literally prevents other Facebook users from seeing when you were last logged onto your account. In several different circumstances - which will be discussed in the next section - turning off your last seen status can help you avoid situations that you may not be looking forward to dealing with.

When you turn off your last seen status - or your activity status - others cannot see that you have previously been on Facebook within the last hour, day, week, etc. While it may be evident that you actually have been online if you have outed yourself by posting or sharing content, if you have done nothing but scroll through your feed or check out different accounts, other Facebook users will be none the wiser.

So, by hiding your last seen status, your account:

• Prevents mutual users from seeing your previous interactions on Facebook
• Does not show any Facebook user when you were last on Facebook - unless you have interacted by posting, sharing, sending friend requests, etc.

Staying Incognito While You Use Facebook

Turning off your last seen status on Facebook also prevents other users from seeing if you are currently logged into your account. Whether you want to avoid certain people or are simply not in the mood for socializing, turning off your activity status is the best way to accomplish these things.

When your activity status is switched off, you are free to browse around as much as you want on Facebook without other people knowing about it. Unless you like or share posts, or send a friend request to someone, no other users can see your current activity on Facebook.

Hiding your last seen status allows you to reap benefits such as:

• The freedom to browse Facebook privately, without other users seeing that you are currently online
• Avoiding having to interact with other users that may notice you are online
• Not having your account show that you are online if you forget to log out

Keeping Your Information Private

Another great benefit to turning off your activity status includes the reassurance that Facebook does value their customers’ preferences. In today’s world, something as small as gossip, to as serious as scandal, can be shared across the world with a few clicks of a button. By remaining under the radar with an inactive last seen status, you can avoid situations in which you may not want to find yourself.

To be more specific, suppose, for the sake of argument, that your friend has begun questioning why you do not talk to them anymore. In reality, you have just not felt like reaching out to anyone, but your friend might take this as a personal insult. They might feel the need to start gossip about you. If they see you are scrolling through Facebook, this will give them further confidence that you are intentionally avoiding them.

Of course, this is a very unlikely, overly extreme case, but surely you get the picture. Staying incognito by turning off your last seen status on Facebook allows you to keep your personal life as personal as you would like it to be.

In a more relatable sense, turning off your activity status on Facebook may also prevent outside websites from seeing your interactions on Facebook. If you want to make sure that your information stays as private as possible, cutting off other platforms from access to your account further ensures that your information stays with you.

Privacy is a must. Turning off your last seen status can help in several ways:

• Preventing third-party websites from monitoring your data
• Keeping your comings and goings private as to not start unnecessary drama in your personal life
• Better protecting your personal information from the public eye

Specific Reasons for Why You May Want to Hide Your Activity Status

There are several reasons that you might want to keep your social media activity hidden: avoiding certain people, keeping your information from being shared, etc. In different situations, you might want to turn off your last seen status.

Keeping in mind what has been discussed above, here are a few different examples of situations that you can avoid by turning off your activity status on Facebook.

Avoiding Certain Facebook Users

Whether it be for more personal reasons, or something as simple as not wanting to engage with a particular person, you might want to hide your activity status from particular Facebook users. Privacy is essential for many reasons, from needing time to yourself to keeping your personal life to an exclusive group of people.

Wanting to avoid certain - or all - Facebook users is a perfectly valid justification for keeping your activity status on Facebook hidden. Suppose you are not in the mood for interaction. In that case, you should be able to browse social media freely without having to worry about a notification from someone snooping on your profile. Hiding your last seen status on Facebook helps with:

• Avoiding certain users
• Giving you privacy when you are simply not in the mood for human interaction
• Allowing you to browse Facebook freely without having to worry about others seeing you

Keeping Yourself from Being Monitored

For many people, privacy from those who have access to monitoring the social media website you are using is a significant concern. This is another completely understandable fear. When using a platform to show your personal life, accounts you interact with, and more, it can be a bit scary to think about who - if anyone - is watching your every move.

Social media is obviously a very open platform in several considerations. Still, in most cases, you will be interacting with mutual friends - with the occasional keeping up with celebrities and other popular accounts. Trusting a platform to refrain from monitoring you can be a tough decision, so if turning off your last seen status reassures you that you are taking necessary precautions, go right ahead.

Advantages of turning off your last seen status to avoid being monitored include:

• The most efficient way to hide your Facebook use to the best of your ability
• Preventing Facebook from notifying other users when you are or have been online

Staying Hidden from Miscellaneous Website Tracking

Continuing along the lines of being monitored by others, you might also want to keep your interactions hidden from other websites. Have you ever been scrolling through your Facebook feed, and suddenly, an advertisement pops up for the exact same top you were looking at while online shopping a few days ago?

It is no secret that social media platforms probably have access to information about other websites you visit. While you may not be able to make this high possibility completely go away, hiding your last seen status on Facebook can be a step in the right direction. For example:

• Doing everything in your power to hide your personal online status makes it more difficult for third-party websites to track your web interactions.
• Knowing that you have at least some security over your online life is at least somewhat reassuring.

Takeaway

As you can see, hiding your last seen status on Facebook is a simple process, and it can be beneficial in several circumstances. These days, maintaining privacy is of utmost importance to many people. By hiding your last seen status on Facebook, you can further ensure that your interactions on social media are as protected as possible.