Facebook is a great way to keep in touch with friends and family, but sometimes you may have sent a message to the wrong person or misunderstood something.
Deleting Facebook messages can be a quick and easy way to resolve this while also protecting your privacy at the same time.
In this article, we will show you how to delete Facebook messages.
Facebook changes settings and features very often and there was a time when deleting Facebook messages wasn’t possible. So, can you delete them now?
Can you delete messages in Facebook Messenger?
No need to worry if you accidentally send a message on Messenger that you didn’t intend on sending. As of 2018 Facebook has allowed users to “unsend” Facebook messages, pictures, videos, or links that they didn’t intend on sending.
You can select individual messages that were sent at any time, and remove them so they are no longer seen in your message thread or you can unsend them for everyone so that no one can see that message.
Keep in mind that if it is an older message there can be a chance that the recipient will have seen the message, either in their phone notification banner or in the chat history itself.
You can check if your message was seen by the recipient by looking in the bottom right corner of the chat, next to your most recent message.
If they have seen the message a small circular icon of the recipient’s Facebook profile picture will be displayed.
If they haven’t seen it a grey circle with a white checkmark will appear in the same place.
So, how do you delete Facebook messages? Let’s start with Facebook on a desktop.
How to delete messages in Facebook Messenger on desktop
If you want to delete an individual Facebook message here is how you would do so on a desktop computer.
- Open Facebook and log into your account.
- On the right-hand side under the heading “Contacts”, select the name of the person or search for their name.
- In the chat window that will pop up on the right-hand side, scroll until you find the message that you would like to delete.
- Use your cursor to hover over the white space on the left-hand side of the message you want to delete.
- You will see three icons appear, select the three dots and click “remove”.
- Facebook will ask you to choose to “unsend for everyone” or to “remove for you”.
- To delete the message select “unsend for everyone”.
How to delete messages in Facebook Messenger on mobile
Deleting a message from Facebook messenger on mobile is a little bit different.
If you want to delete an individual Facebook message on mobile, here is how you would do so.
- Open the Facebook Messenger app.
- Select the conversation that contains the messages you would like to delete.
- Scroll until you find the message you would like to delete.
- Click and hold the message.
- Options to react with emojis will pop up as well as text at the bottom of the screen.
- Click “More” in the right-hand corner.
- Select “unsend”, then you can choose to unsend for everyone or just for you.
Unsending the message for everyone effectively deletes the message from both people’s chat histories.
How do I delete conversations from Facebook Messenger?
It is possible to delete entire message threads from Facebook Messenger, which can be useful if you want to clean up your inbox or remove certain messages from other Facebook users.
If you would like to remove a whole conversation thread here is how you delete the conversation from Facebook Messenger.
- Open the Facebook Messenger app.
- Scroll and find the person whose chat you would like to delete or search for their name in the search bar.
- Click and hold the chat and a pop-up will appear.
- At the bottom of the pop-up select “Delete”.
- You will be asked to confirm, click “Delete”.
This option deletes the chat history from your Facebook Messenger, but it will still be seen by the other user on their chat history.
Final thoughts on deleting messages from Facebook
Now that you know how to delete Facebook messages, it’s important to understand their consequences.
Deleting messages can be a great way to protect your privacy, but remember that they’re gone for good once they’re gone.
If you need to reference a message or conversation later on, make sure to save a copy before deleting it from your account.
FAQs
Does deleting a message also delete it for the recipient?
When deleting an individual message, you are given the option to unsend it for everyone or just for yourself.
By clicking the “unsend for everyone” option, you are deleting the message from your chat history and the recipient’s chat history.
This is the same for chats with more than two members in them.
How do I permanently delete my Facebook messages on both sides?
As of today, there is no simple shortcut to delete your chat thread permanently on both sides.
You can delete the chat history on your side, but unless you have access to the recipient’s phone, you cannot delete your chat history from their side.
The closest option would be to unsend all the messages you have sent them and then delete the chat from your Facebook Messenger.
Although this presents two issues, the recipient may have already seen the messages you have sent them, and if you unsend all of your messages, the recipient can still see their replies in your chat thread.
Unsending your messages will permanently delete them from both sides, but there is no way to delete whole chat histories from both sides.
Can the recipient of a message see if I deleted it?
The message recipient can see that you have unsent (deleted) the message.
In their chat history, a message will display that says, “Your name has unsent a message.”
Although they can see that you have sent a message and deleted it, there is no way to retrieve what the original message said.