Facebook Introduces Friends-Only Feed to Prioritize Personal Connections

Facebook is launching a new ‘Friends’ tab to bring back its original social networking purpose—connecting with friends and family. This new feature, currently rolling out in the US and Canada, removes algorithmic recommendations and sponsored content, displaying only posts, stories, reels, and birthdays from friends. Previously, the Friends tab housed friend requests and suggestions, but it has now been repurposed into a dedicated friends-only feed. Users can access it via the navigation bar in the Facebook app and customize its placement. The change is part of CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s broader initiative to restore Facebook’s earlier experience, which focused more on personal connections rather than algorithm-driven content. This move follows last year’s introduction of ‘Local’ and ‘Explore’ tabs that promoted more content recommendations. Facebook has promised to introduce additional nostalgic features throughout the year in an attempt to improve user experience and engagement.