Facebook 101

Managing your News Feed

While Facebook doesn't allow you to customize what stories you'll see first in your News Feed, it does offer some tools to help control what posts and updates can appear in it.

Unfollowing and unfriending

If you ever decide that you'd like to stop seeing updates from certain friends, you can unfollow their posts. To unfollow a friend's posts, locate and select the drop-down arrow on a post, then select Unfollow.

Alternatively, if you no longer want to be friends with someone on Facebook, you can go to that friend's Timeline and select Friends Unfriend. This means you will no longer receive any updates from this person. It also means this person will no longer be able to see any of your nonpublic information.

Likes and your News Feed

Whenever you like something on Facebook you're also subscribing to a Facebook page.

This means updates and advertisements from anyone or anything you've liked—such as business, celebrities, bands, movies, and TV shows—can appear in your News Feed. If you frequently like things on Facebook, your News Feed can easily become overwhelmed with advertisements rather than updates from your friends.

To unsubscribe from a Facebook page you've liked, locate and select the the drop-down arrow on a post, then select Unfollow.

Alternatively, you can go to your Timeline and unlike anything you no longer wish to see in your News Feed.