How to see who follows you on Facebook

While Facebook can be both fun and useful, it also has its security challenges, ranging from the risk of having your account cloned to experiencing online harassment and more. In particular, not everyone friends or follows you for good reasons. People seeking to rob your house, investigate your movements, or disqualify you for a job might sneak their way onto your friends list or follow your page. Keeping track of your lists is a critical part of online safety, since someone who can see your posts can glean so much personal information about you. Fortunately, it isn’t hard to find this information, and we can show you how to see who follows you on Facebook.

How can I see who’s following me on Facebook on desktop

• First, log into Facebook.
• On your home page, look in the upper left, and you will see a link to your profile with your name and profile picture. Click on it.

• Below your name and profile photo, you will see a row of links that open various sections of your profile. Click on the Friends.

• On the Friends tab, there will be another row of links for you to filter your friends into groups depending on where you know them from. Click on Followers.

• Here you will see your list of followers — people who are not your Facebook friends but who have opted to follow your posts. This may include people who sent you a friend request that you ignored or rejected.

How can I see who’s following me on Facebook on mobile

• With your Facebook app open, go to your Profile page.
• On your profile page, below Details, you will see the line See your About info. Tap on it.
• Scroll down to Followers. Select See all.

All your followers will be listed. That’s all there is to it.

How to allow followers on Facebook

If the Followers tab is not visible in your Friends section on your account, it’s probably because your account is configured to disallow followers who are not your friends. If you’d like to change this setting, follow these steps:

• Go to Settings & Privacy, then Settings.

• In the Who can follow me section, if the button is set to Friends, click on it and change the setting to Public.

You can now have followers separate from your friends, and as soon as someone follows you, you will see the Followers tab on your Friends page.

What’s the difference between Facebook friends and followers?

Facebook says following is intended as a way to gain a wider audience for your post, whereas friending is for people you actually know. One of the most important differences between following and friending is that there is no permission needed for someone to follow you. If you have allowed followers, anyone can click on your profile and follow you. A follower has to send a message request before sending you a message. A friend can DM you any time.

What does it do?

Following someone on Facebook means their public posts (the ones they do not restrict to friends or groups) will show up on your timeline. Your posts will not show up on their timeline unless they follow you as well. When you become friends with someone on Facebook, you automatically start following each other, and you will see Friends Only posts as well as public ones from each other. A handy Facebook feature is that you can unfollow a friend without unfriending them, allowing you to limit your exposure to their feed. Each post you make on Facebook can be set to be seen only by friends or by anyone by setting it to Public. (You can even filter your friends list to restrict access to sensitive posts.)

You can choose to allow followers to merely see your posts, or to allow them to comment as well. Also, you can get notifications when a follower shares, likes, or comments on one of your posts, or restrict notifications to when friends interact with your timeline. These choices are also in the Settings menu.

You can follow a person on Facebook, but you can also follow a brand, a town, or a sports team. When you like the page of, say, a sneaker manufacturer, you automatically begin to follow that page as well, but that you can adjust this later.

An example

A good example to describe the difference between friends and followers would be a popular novelist. She has a Facebook account with friends and family and also those who read her books. The friends and family, obviously enough, would be Facebook friends with the novelist. Her readers would be followers. She would tailor each of her posts to be available to everyone or only her friends. This would allow her to use the same Facebook account for both personal and professional purposes.

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