The dead tree version of Wired (March 2008 issue) has a handy hint for how to break up on Facebook without sending a news blast to your friends list about it.
To change your relationship status without the press release, go to Facebook’s privacy options, deselect “Remove My Relationship Status” then, in your profile settings, change “In a Relationship” back to its default setting “Select Status”.
Voila, now you won’t be broadcasting the news of your recent split to the world.
The article points out that your ex’s Mini Feed will still display an update in *their* relationship status, so you can’t get away scot free. They’ll need to delete it themselves. Oh well.
Disable your relationship status on Facebook without making the news
Comments
39 responses to “Disable your relationship status on Facebook without making the news”
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Stephanie
or go to your privacy settings, and go to your news feeds options, and uncheck the box that correlates to relationship status.
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GS
Or you can change your status and then go to your mini feed and hide the story….
Sure – someone may have seen it in the 30 seconds it was changed – but it’s not really hard to hide info from your feed
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LampshadeHat
@GS: Unfortunately your mini-feed isn’t tied to the big news feed, and unless you change your privacy settings, simply deleting the info from the mini-feed doesn’t remove it from the news feed.
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Jose
thanks stephanie. your directions were clear.
the author’s steps were unclear:
1) go to Facebook’s privacy options
where it says privacy on the upper right hand side? ok.2) deselect “Remove My Relationship Status”
where? i don’t see the option.3) in your profile settings, change “In a Relationship” back to its default setting “Select Status”.
where? i don’t see the option.instructions failed.
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Ninni
This is kinda off topic, but does any one know how to change the the status of some of your friends to restricted after they’ve been added?
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jay
How can I prevent receiving mini-feeds or news-feeds from specific friends ?
thank you -
will
can this be undone? i have removed mine from my account but want it back, is there any way to do this? or is it gone for good once you do it?
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Ethan
Here’s how I removed relationship status completely from “info” page on profile. First, go to your profile. Open “basic information.” Use the pull-down menu on relationship status. Here’s the important part: above the option for “single,” there’s a completely blank option — there’s no text, and it’s hard to see at first, but it is there. Pick that blank option. Hit “save changes.” That should work. Let me know if you agree.
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Kitty
With the new timeline you do similar but it’s easier. Click on the “about” on your profile/timeline then “basic info” then on relationship status click the little triangle by the gear and select “only me” You will still see it but no one else will.
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adam
Ethan, you are a star. I have been lookinq for this for almost a year…. the completely blank option is hardly obvious!!!
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Victor
Megan and Ethan. if you already have a boy/girlfriend, it will tell them ” your boy/girlfriend has removed you as their boy/girlfriend…. thats what we are trying to NOT do.
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Trish
okay, heres how you hide your relationship status WITHOUT notifying anyone including your current spouse.
-go to ‘edit my profile’ (under your profile picture)
-once the editing box opens, click on the information box that has your relationhip status.
-A small box should open that has the options to hide certain information including your relationship status.
-Click on relationships and your golden.Editing that information will NOT go to your news feed and will NOT notify anyone including your spouse. However, if anyone on your friends list visits your profile, they will see that your relationship is blank even if your still currently in that relationship. This also implies to your spouse when he/she visits your profile page
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youke
instead i wanna hide my relationship status, i have been tried to change my status from in a relationship with xxx to engaged to xxx, and of course hoping that it will be appears on both our profile just like before.. but from the moment i changed it, it only appears on my profile or his.. it didn’t appear on both.. i’m wondering why.. tried many different ways, but didn’t work.. does anyone know how to solve this? thanks..
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Lisseth
I got a quick question about the relationship status on facebook, i put in a relationship with and the name of my boyfriend in the box and he just recently got the request and accepted it but somehow its saying he is in a relationship with another girl when he clicked on my pic request and he changed the status back to the blank box but it is still showing her name in his info and status, is there anyway he can delete that or the girl has to do it on her end because i also send him a request again but its saying he is already in a relationship and he has tried changing it a few times but it is still showing in a relationship with that girl. Please help if possible
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Felicia Bell
well since facebook changed their privacy settings, the options and settings are completely different and i was wondering how to change this setting now for the news feed when it doesn’t show it anymore.
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amy winston
one of my friends is deeply wounded by a guy she loves who wont put in a relationship with {insert her name}
so she wanted to merely hide the fact that she already added “in a relationship with”
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/settings/?tab=privacy§ion=profileso to privacy and click on controls for
family and relationships
select “only me”
as person who can view it.Voila !
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Chris
Guess what people? Facebook officially f*cked us all over, because now you can’t make changes to your status without it becoming public news. You used to be able to hide it from others that viewed your page, while still keeping the relationship status intact. No more, now you have to cancel the relationship. Just another example of how programmers f*ck websites up with their crappy creativity…
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kada
thanks ethan! there’s a option which is blank over single. U have to click that one and save it! thus u can remove relationship status.
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Cha
@kada, what do you do if u want to feed your rel. status after u have hid it before? u know with the blank over the single thingy.
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Kate
There is a way to hide your relationship status on the new layout. Go to privacy settings and under ‘family and relationship’ category, select the ‘only me’ option. Or, you can customize which of your friends can and can’t see your relationship status when they view your profile. It will not show up in the recent activity. Hope this helps!
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myrelationshipstatusisprivate
Ethan nailed it!!!!! The only answer that made sense and worked. Wow@Facebook not allowing that option above “Single” option to be known!!!!!!!
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Seraphim
Privacy Settings > Customize Settings > Relationships Tab > Custom > These People > Only Me
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grichael
i have looked all over the web for an answer to my question and this is the only place that comes close to answering it. How do i remove my name from someone else’s relationship status? I chose to ignore the request and it still displays my name.
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ALBERT
HEY,
YOU CAN SIMPLY GO TO THE AREA THAT SAYS ACCOUNT THAT IS ON THE RIGHT DEPENDING ON YOUR BROWSER. AND THEN YOU GO TO THE PRIVACY SETTING-THEN AN AREA APPEARS SAYING CUSTOMIZE SETTINGS.CLICK IT AND IT CARRIES YOU TO THE PLACE THAT SAY: POST BY MAIL, FAMILY AND LASTLY RELATIONSHIP, CLICK ON IT.
THIS ENABLE YOU CONTROL WHO YOU WANT TO SEE YOUR RELATIONSHIP STATUS, AND WHO YOU DON’T WANNA SEE IT.
GOOD LUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Om Omm
Hey,
I have deleted a relationship status with the other party. It no longer appears on my page. But why am I still listed as in relationship on their side (the other person’s profile page)? is that common and is there a way to fix it? or the other party jus has to remove me himself? thanks much 🙂 -
Chloe Alderan
YES YOU CAN hide your relationship status using the method above, but YOU CANNOT stop facebook from sending out a news update when you make the change.
If you think you’re slick and change your status to the “blank” option, think again. I tried it, and was successful achieving “no status” on my profile.
However, facebook immediately sends out an announcement in the news feed. It doesn’t ask your permission, in fact it doesn’t tell you it’s doing it. I only knew it happened when people started commenting and calling me. I checked FB and saw a post with a little broken heart, “Chloe is no longer in a relationship”
WTF Facebook!!!!
Even if you hide your relationship status from ppl, they still see your news feed and there is nothing they can do about it. The worst part is people think that YOU did this.
So just be aware: refresh the newsfeed the second you make the change, and when you see the red broken heart, delete the post. This way, only the tiny number of people who happen to be checking FB at that moment will see it.
Unfortunately, it’s the best you can do.
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Freak
I have two girls both active on Facebook, the one just sent me a relationship request, I wanna make the otheR one not notice a single thing…comments on statuses etc. Is it possible?
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Tom
Chloe – Actually, there is a text that pops up stating that they will be sending the other party a notice for approval, etc.
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belzi
FB keeps changing layout, security settings etc., but right now, the best way to change relationship status without letting your friends or your partner know is this:
Go to privacy settings
Customize privacy settings
Edit privacy settings for “Relationships”to : only me
Edit privacy settings for “can see wall posts by friends” to : only me
(this will disable any of your friends to see your wall until you change it back, no posts or updates of yours will show up in their newsfeed during that time)Change relationship status to: single
(your fb-partner will not be notified since they cannot see your wall, and your privacy settings for relationships is set to only you, it will appear in the newsfeed of your own fb page but only you can see it)Change back privacy settings for “can see wall posts by friends” to : “friends” (or whatever you like)
done
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belzi
Addendum:
You must keep the privacy settings for your relationship status set to: “only me” for at least a day, until it is too old to appear in the newsfeed of others.
If you want your partner, but noone else to know you can edit this in the “hide from” /”show only to” boxThe popup text saying that your partner will be notified is no longer there. There is a “save changes” button at the bottom of the page, klick it and it will say “your changes have been saved”
If you sent a relationship request to someone it will say “waiting for approval” next to the persons name that appears in the “in a relationship with” box, that is all.
So be sure of your changes, before you save them, there is no asking about second thoughts. -
captn
I no longer have the option to change my relationship status in edit profile?
Help -
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lynnchan111
How can I add my boyfriend back on Facebook realtionshiop? We were messing with the blocking feature to see how it works and how far it goes. When we unblocked eachother like 30min after we saw our raionship just said relationship and we can’t add eachother back into relationship anymore. We tries putting single and back to raionship but our name doesn’t pop up. Did we make a unchangeable mistake?
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