Updated Dec 2013: Facebook Brings Back “Recent Activity” Options

Where is it?: Recent Activity is the last box in the left-hand column on your timeline/profile. If you have no recent activity, you won’t see the box.

To hide activity: Click on the x next to a post in the box, and click on “Hide all [story type]…”

hiding activity

To unhide activity: First, click the pencil icon in the top right corner of the box, then click on hidden activity.

restoring hidden activity

Then a box like the one below should appear, Click the “x” next to the things you want to restore to your Recent Activity.

hidden acitivity menu

That’s it!
Update 7 (December 15, 2013): With the addition of Facebook’s “Following” button on people’s profiles, some of the information below has changed. The below is outdated, but kept for reference

Event Activity Not Showing Up Under Recent Activity on Timeline: Report It

Update 6 (January 4, 2012): Some users are reporting that some of their recent activity is no longer showing up, like comments on other friends’ posts or event activity on Facebook Timeline. It appears Facebook has now removed the option to display such stories at all on Timeline.  Some users (and I’ve tested myself now) cannot unhide their Event activity if they had hidden it in the past. From now on, stories such as commenting and event activity will appear in the News Feed and Ticker based on your friends’ subscriptions to you.

For example, if you go to a friend’s Timeline, you will not be able to see whose posts they have commented on recently. If you want to find out, you would have to go to Subscribed (at the top) and check “Comments and Likes.” From then on, whenever that friend likes or comments on something, it will appear in the Ticker (above the chat bar on the right side). Facebook recently removed the option to choose whose comments/likes you would see in the News Ticker.

It does not look like Facebook will ever restore commenting/event activity to Timeline. There is a glitch with Event activity that has yet to be fixed… Report It

Edit: I have been doing some testing and look at this:

Event Activity
Event stories do not appear under Recent Activity in the old profile…

And after switching to the new profile….

It seems it works now…

Alright, so event activity should appear on the timeline. We clearly have a problem now….

Update 5 (November 6, 2011): If you are using Facebook timeline, you can edit which types of updates you’ve hidden by clicking on the pencil icon to the right of the Recent Activity box as shown below

View Hidden Activity by clicking on the pencil icon and then selecting “Hidden Activity…” from the drop down list.

If you are looking to hide activity, simply click the “x” that appears when you hover over a recent activity story and click “Hide Similar Activity from Timeline.”

To hide recent activity stories of one type, click on the “x” that appears when you hover over a post and select “Hide Similar Activity from Timeline” in the drop down list.

Update 4: Facebook has brought back the Edit Options link at the bottom of my wall. If you have accidentally hid any type of activity on your wall, you can now un-hide it by going to the bottom of your wall, clicking on Edit Options, and clicking the “x” next to the type of story you want to un-hide. Note that the Edit Options link may take a while to propagate to all users once again.

Update 3: Speculation. Some users had reported that some links, such as YouTube videos, they were sharing did not appear on their wall, only on their news feed. These users had also reported that they had clicked on “hide all comment activity.” I believe that there might have been a bug that caused links to disappear when a person hid their comment activity. Facebook has most likely taken the recent activity options off for now while they sort out this bug and hopefully it will be back up soon. Can anyone confirm that they were not able to see their links they had shared after they hid all comment activity? Comment below

Original Post: It looks like Facebook has begun to roll out the “Recent Activity” options to its users. Facebook removed these options and defaulted all recent activity to “on” back in December of 2009. Take a look at what I found earlier this evening:

Facebook "Recent Activity" Settings
An option is now listed that allows you to hide all likes.

“Recent Activity” shows recent comments users have made on posts, and recent pages they have liked, as well as public events users are attending and other things. Back in December 2009, Facebook, somehow, decided that it would be always on, and if a user didn’t want a post to show up, they would have to manually remove it each time.

These settings bring more privacy back to Facebook! If a user comments on a friend’s status, and that status was set to friends of friends, by default, all* the user’s friends would see that they commented on that friend’s status, regardless of friendship, in their news feed. Now, users can set it up so that their comments aren’t shown in their recent activity.

I appreciate Facebook bringing back this option. It was annoying to have to go into my wall and remove posts that I didn’t want to show up in my friends’ news feeds.

To unhide a certain type of “recent activity” story on your wall, scroll to the bottom of the wall, click on Edit Options, and click the “x” next to the type of story you want to unhide.

This post has been formatted from its original version. Updates 1 & 2 have been edited into the story/removed.

*Note: Not all users are guaranteed to see the post, depending on each individual’s news feed settings.  

71 thoughts on “Updated Dec 2013: Facebook Brings Back “Recent Activity” Options”

  1. I discovered this feature as well and prematurely hid a category of activities that I didn’t want hidden, under the mistaken impression that I would be able to undo it under some sort of settings menu. Very unfortunate and irritating. I’m glad Facebook is allowing us to decide what activities we don’t want shown, but it would be really nice if they offered a more convenient way to customize this instead of making all decisions irreversible.

    1. I’ve updated my blog with this info, but you can unhide story types by clicking the Edit Options link at the bottom of your wall. From there, you can unhide the story types you have hidden, such as comments or likes.

    2. you can change it. you scroll down to the bottom of your page where it says see more there is the option to edit options and then you can undo whatever you made private.

  2. “It was annoying to have to go into my wall and remove posts that I didn’t want to show up in my friends’ news feeds.”

    Sadly, after some experimenting, I found that even after deleting the mention of comments you’ve from your wall. People would STILL get notices sent to them in their stream it seems. Probably depending on their setting I suppose? Someone just looking at your profile would not see them “there” once deleted though.

    I found YOUR wordpress after getting a variation of this last night when I was deleting a comment. Mine merely said “Hide all comment activity” is what i got. And it’s working. But, not everyone is getting this however it seems. Rolling out slowly?

    1. It is supposed to remove it, although I have been experiencing issues with it as well. I remove it from my wall but it isn’t removed from my friends’ news feed right away. It takes a while.

      1. Interesting thing. I enabled this and now, if I post my status in text, people see it on all formats of FB. If I post a youtube link, it doesn’t show up on the PC version of face book, but can be seen on the Touch FB site and through the Android FB App. Wonder what else shows up on the mobile based sites. I’ve found inconsistencies in the past. Now to play with ‘what” ielse gets blocked and what opens things back up. I’ll simply assume by “not” using this. Nice work FB guys… Share, or be crippled huh? Nice.

  3. there is NO “EDIT OPTIONS” ON MY WALL PAGE…HOW DO I UNHIDE RECENT ACTIVITY??? I CAN’T EVEN SEE THE LINKS OR NOTES I POST!!! HELP!!!!!

  4. PLEASE, PLEASE…help me! I need to know how to UNDO the “hide all comment activity!”

    I post links on the news feed and to other people’s pages, and it’s not showing up on my wall!

    I hope someone can help me!

    Thanks, aloha.

    1. As for the Hide all comment activity, there used to be an option just a few days ago at the bottom of the wall where it said “Edit Options.” Facebook temporarily removed it to fix the bug above, I suppose. It has now been fixed. You should now be able to unhide hidden activity by clicking Edit Options at the bottom of your wall.

  5. 🙁 I had this option for only one day, at the beginning of this week, and it’s going already.

    Have they revoked the “Hide all Like activity” options again?

    1. No. I still have mine. Note that you must be on your profile/wall page, and can hide only like activity from Pages, not from photos or links you like on other people’s profiles or websites.

  6. OMG I get it now. People, you have to scroll all the bottom until you reach all your older posts.Until it says
    “no more posts” then you can click “options edit”

  7. In Edit-options , its showing u don’t have any activty hidden . But still m not able to see any of my Recent activity . pls help if anyone knows d solution ..:(

    1. If you use FB Purity, make sure you have not hidden recent activity. FB Purity is a browser add-on that lets you hide certain kinds of stuff in Facebook. If you are using it, you will see “FB Purity” below the status box.

  8. hey, ive somehow made my privacy setting so that other can only see my facebook activity if that activity relates to a mutual friend. how can i make it so that all my facebook activity is unhidden ie others can see my activity even if they are not friends with the person whom ive posted to? ive tried the ‘edit options’ solution which did not fix it. thanksss

    1. sorry. This option is not available as it respects the privacy of the friend you interacted with. If the friend has public privacy settings, then your recent activity with them will be visible to everyone. If they have private privacy settings (eg. Friends only) then only their friends will see the activity on your profile.

  9. i have my recent activity totally unblocked but they still dont show up in the newsfeed or the new scrolling box. when i type in my gf name it only shows comments i made on her post and if i type in another friends name it shows the same thing. how do i get to where every one can see my activity?

    1. you won’t see it in your news feed or your “scroller” because you already know about it. however, your friends should see it in their news feed/scroll box depending on their subscription settings to you.

      other things to note: if you commented on something, only those friends who can see what you commented on will see a story in their teed (eg. if you comment on mark’s post (set to friends only), and i, friends with you but not with mark, will not be able to see that you commented on a post of mark. however, if mark has post set to friends of friends or public, then i will be able to see that you commented on his post).

  10. i hid all my friend activity actions and i want to unhide it so Clicked “Edit Options” at the bottom of my profile page but it just saids “You have not hidden anything.” its really frustrating, i tried every ways, clicked every tabs and buttons but still no answer 🙁

    1. Go to that friend’s profile and click on “Friends” in the top right corner. There, you will be able to select the type of actions you want to see in your news feed from that friend.

      Facebook is currently in the midst of transferring everyone over to tne new Timeline (http://facebook.com/about/timelne). This may result in errors while trying to edit the options at the bottom of your profile.

  11. hi everytime i add a friend on facebook it doesnt show up on my facebook wall at all and when i got to edit options theres nothing written there to press x on can you please help me

    1. – make sure FB purity is not installed on your system. this can hide certain posts.
      – make sure you are going to Edit Options at the bottom of your wall, not at the bottom of your home page

  12. i accidently clicked ‘hide all recent comment’s’ and now i cant even see on my wall that whr i commented plezzzzzzzzzzzzzzzee hellppppp m3333333333333333 =( i want to undo it now!!!

  13. i updated to the new Facebook with timeline and now there is no “Edit options” on the bottom of my time line. i am trying to unhide event activity.. how can i do so? thank you!

  14. Events i’m attending do not show up on my facebook wall. I’ve already tried the steps/comments above and still nothing – no FB purity and the events activity is not hidden at the ‘edit options’ part of my facebook wall. Not sure what to do to get it back? Thanks

    1. HI again, Eric. I’ve discovered that event activity will only appear in the News Feed and Ticker, not in Timeline. It’s programmed this way. Read the update above for more info.

  15. How do I unhide my recent activity on my timeline/profile? I accidentally hid it (the entire Recent Activity box is gone) and can’t figure out how to get it back.

  16. yes the option 1 is true but it seems to be insufficent info. to unhide past cmmnts done on fbuk 🙁 m unable to unhide my past cmmnts

    1. it seems comments do not appear on the timeline… i see no comments i’ve made on other people’s posts in the timeline. you can go to activity log and see your comments there.

  17. AND BTW WAT ABT THE COMMENTS ON THE POSTS??????????? NONE OF THEM CAN BE SEEN ON TIMELINE!!!!!!!!! TIMELINE SUCKSSSS BIG TIME!!!!!!

  18. Ok, so I spent hours trying to work out why my comments on others’ links and posts were not showing up on my own Timeline. I actually like being able to ascertain when and what I typed x many hours/days/weeks ago when I was off my tree or even sober for that matter. My comments show up in my Activity Log. Yet this same information can not be enabled on my Timeline. Back when the Wall was still in effect, one could always see when and what comments had been made and subsequent additional comments. My question is there any way around this yet or is there an add-on that can be obtained? I also, upon reflecting, am pretty sure that I have seen Liked notifications on some of my posts on others’ posts in my Activity Log but have not been notified by the comment notifier in the top left hand corner. That is the 3rd icon to the right after the Friend Request and Messages icons. Can anybody confirm this?!

    1. go to m.facebook.com in Internet Explorer. that should work to view comments on some peoples profiles who have already converted to timeline.

      as for liked notifications, what are you trying to say? Are you saying people liked your comment, but you were not notified in the notifications bar?

  19. Mattjs92, I have read your original instructions as well as your update for timeline. Here is my issue: I see that Facebook now has a “Recent activity” box on timeline. From there you can click the “x” next to any activity and hide that activity or hide similar activity. Great. But back in the day I changed my privacy settings for events. And now when I click that I am attending an event (yes, even a public one) it does not show in my recent activity. I know it should because I see events in my friends’ recent activity. When i click edit options or show hidden activity it says I have not hidden anything. Any idea how to go back and change this? I’ve looked everywhere.

    Thanks!

    1. alright, as you can see i was doing some testing above and it does appear that EVENT activity should appear on the timeline as (now) shown above… yet I cannot get it back on my own Timeline. Clearly we must all report the issue to Facebook.

  20. I also have a problem regarding with your explaination about your update no. 3. All my shared links and posts were hidden. I accidentally click the button “hide all…” and in instance all my links and status updates etc was gone and only can be seen at recent activities…I don’t know how to put it back to my wall ;(, I’m really sad about it.. I wish I did not update my old profile to timeline.

    1. Comment activity does not show on Timeline, no matter whose Timeline you are on. To see recent comment activity from your friends, go to their profile, click on the “subscribed” button and make sure “comments” is checked. Then look in the ticker in the chat sidebar or the ticker on the homepage if you don’t have a wide enough screen. Recent comments by friends will now appear here.

  21. When I post on someone’s wall or comment on something it used to show that on my profile in quotes. This is gone now. I remember hiding a post, and now nothing shows up. I would now like this back and I have tried for hours and it won’t work. I have the Timeline. There is no “Edit Options” button if I scroll all the way down. Please help me.

    1. Timeline does not allow posts you make on other people’s profile to show on your wall. They now appear in your friends’ tickers (the mini news feed above the chat bar) if they have subscribed to your comments and likes. To see a list of comments you have made, click on the “Activity Log” at the top of your profile.

  22. Are you sure that’s the new facebook format and not a glitch? Mine shows no activity except new friends. Everyone else’s Recent Activity at least will show Likes and Profile Changes. I’ve tried every setting, even making all my posts public. Still no dice.

    1. click on the pencil icon at the top right of the activity box and select edit options. then, click the “x” next to hidden activity.

      There is a glitch with event activity. facebook has not fixed it yet….

  23. I’m having the same problem garret is……mine shows no activity except for new friends…..I WANT to have comments I’ve posted on friends wall’s to show up on my timeline….I tried the pencil option you mention….and the box is empty saying I have not hidden anything. How can you revert to the old style?

    1. You cannot go back. Tell your friends to go to your timeline, click on Subscribed (top-right) and make sure “comments and Likes” are checked. They will see your comments appear in the ticker as you make them. If you want to see your comments, go to your activity log at the top of the timeline.

  24. I have wrongly deleted my “activity recent” box and now I can’t see my postings & also postings from my friends. This just happened this October 2012. I only have the ‘PHOTOS’, ‘FRIENDS’. ‘LIKES’, ‘PLACES’ Except the “ACTIVITY recent’ box.

    How I can to restore the ACTIVITY BOX?

    Please help me. Thank you in advance.

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    1. it should appear on the right hand side of your timeilnle. if you don’t see it, then, you probably haven’t done any recent activity. try doing something like liking a page and then coming back to your profile to see if it is there.

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