Facebook has begun hiding likes
The social media giant is testing hiding the number of likes, reactions and views that posts get.
- I've been covering technology and mobile for 12 years, first as a telecommunications reporter and assistant editor at ZDNet in Australia, then as CNET's West Coast head of breaking news, and now in the Thought Leadership team.
Facebook will begin testing hiding the number of likes, reactions and views that posts get.
Facebook began hiding likes on Friday, Sept. 27, making the number of reactions, views and likes visible only to a post's author. The test kicked off in Australia, the social media giant confirmed last week, and includes ads.
How the like "count" will appear during the test.
"We are running a limited test where like, reaction and video view counts are made private across Facebook," a Facebook spokesperson told CNET in an emailed statement on Sept. 26.
Facebook added that it would "gather feedback to understand whether this change will improve people's experiences."
As of Sept. 30, Facebook said it is still expanding the experiment to more people in Australia, but it should be out to the majority of people in the country within the next day or two.
The social network indicated earlier in September that it might experiment with hiding likes, after testing the approach on Facebook-owned Instagram this year. In August, Facebook said the Instagram test was meant to "remove the pressure of how many likes a post will receive" on Instagram, and that Facebook was "excited by the early test results."
As of July, Instagram like counts were hidden in seven countries: Australia, Canada, Brazil, New Zealand, Ireland, Italy and Japan.
First published at 1:57 p.m. PT on Sept. 26.
Updated on Sept. 27 at 4:51 p.m.: Adds more info; Sept. 30 at 1.21 p.m.: Adds update from Facebook.