Check Facebook Privacy Settings by Viewing Your Profile or Timeline as Others See It

Sifting through Facebook’s endless privacy settings can be time-consuming and confusing for users who have never before attempted to restrict access to their Facebook profile/timeline.

One way to get a clear idea about the impact of your Facebook privacy settings is to use a handy site feature that lets you preview how your Facebook profile/timeline looks to other people.

The Facebook “View As” tool shows exactly what your profile/timeline looks to the users that you select; for example, you can see how your profile looks to friends and family to whom you’ve awarded full access and how it looks to the people to whom you’ve restricted access, unfriended or blocked completely.

Step-by-Step Guide to Using the Facebook ‘View As’ Tool

1. Click on your Facebook profile name in the main navigation menu bar of any Facebook page.
2. Click the gray Edit Profile button at the top of the page.
3. Click the gray View As ... button in the top right corner of the page.
4. By default, the View As page shows how your Facebook profile looks to the public when they visit the page from a search engine result.
5. In the This is how your profile looks to the public input field, type a friend or contact’s name. The View As page changes to display your profile as it looks to the person you selected. Repeat this with the names of different friends and contacts to check that you’ve configured your privacy settings correctly.