5 Hidden Facebook Messenger Tricks You Probably Haven’t Used Before

Earlier this month Facebook Messenger revealed that it has reached a massive following of 800 million people.

According to the social networking giant, these people chat with each other on a monthly basis, exchanging text, videos, photos as well as audio recordings. The app can also be used to make free voice and video calls.

While these are the most common uses of Messenger, there are a wide range of other things that this app offers in adding to instant messaging. Actually, the owner of the app wants this app to be a one-stop shop for all mobile needs, whether it is sending money or requesting an Uber ride.

Having said that and done, we’ve rounded up the top 5 hidden Facebook Messenger tricks that you can take advantage of and get the most out of this world-popular chat app.

Use Facebook Messenger on the Web

Just like WhatsApp Web, it is possible to access the services of Facebook Messenger on the web. The standalone website allows you to chat with friends without being bothered by the News Feed. You won’t feel any different when inside this web client, apart from the fact that it offers a much more minimal and clean interface, but in an expanded mode.

The platform offers basic features such as muting conversations, making voice and video calls as well as viewing the photos shared with contacts on the app.

Facebook Messenger can be used with a phone number

As opposed to previous versions where the users had to depend on their Facebook credentials in order to sign in to Messenger, the latest version allows signing in with a phone number, just like WhatsApp. What you need to do is select “Not on Facebook?” when signing up for an account.

Call an Uber ride

You no longer need that Uber app installed on your phone thanks to last year’s partnership between Facebook and Uber. When chatting with your friend, tap on “More” or simply the three dots and then tap “Transportation”. Go ahead and log in, request an Uber ride and from there on, you can get updates on the current status of your ride, notify friends of your status, track the ride as well as pay for it right from within the app.

Mute notifications

Facebook Messenger allows users to play around with the notifications settings of each individual conversation. Just tap on a given name and in the options menu that comes up, tap on “Notifications” and then select the duration you want notifications about this contact turned off. You can always go back here and turn on the notifications.

Use facial recognition to share photos instantly

Facebook developers have been pushing quite a number of amazing features to the Messenger app. Among them is Photo Magic, which relies on facial recognition technology to ease the process of sharing photos with friends. When enabled, you will be notified to share a given photo when the feature detects a friend’s face in the same photo. This will happen with any other photo your phone captures as long as the Messenger app retains the permission to access your camera roll.

The feature can be enabled via the settings icon located at the bottom right of the screen then select Photos and Media. From there choose Photo Magic and enable it by switching the toggle on.