Quick Answer
Making your Facebook cover photo private is easy to do. Just go to your profile, click on “Update Cover Photo” and under the Audience section, choose “Only Me”. This will make your cover photo visible only to you.
Steps to Make Your Facebook Cover Photo Private
Here are the detailed steps to make your Facebook cover photo private so that only you can see it:
1. Login to your Facebook account and go to your profile page.
2. Click on the camera icon that says “Update Cover Photo” under your existing cover photo.
3. A pop-up window will open with options to upload a new photo, choose from your existing photos, reposition your existing cover photo etc.
4. After selecting the photo you want to use as your new cover photo, look for the audience selector under the photo.
5. By default, the audience will be set to “Public” which means anyone who visits your profile can see your cover photo.
6. Click on the audience selector and change it from “Public” to “Only Me”.
7. This will make your new cover photo visible only to you. No one else will be able to see it.
8. Click on “Save Changes” at the bottom to apply the new private cover photo to your profile.
Who Can See Your Cover Photo
By default, your Facebook cover photo is public, meaning that anyone who visits your profile can see it. Here is who can see your cover photo based on the audience setting:
| Audience | Who Can See |
|---|---|
| Public | Anyone including people who are not your friends |
| Friends | Your friends on Facebook |
| Only Me | Only you |
| Custom | You can customize visibility to friends, friends except acquaintances, specific friend lists etc. |
So if you don’t want your cover photo to be seen by people who are not your friends, choose the Friends or Only Me option.
Why Would You Want to Make Your Cover Photo Private?
Here are some common reasons why people make their Facebook cover photos private:
– You want to use a personal photo that you only feel comfortable sharing with close friends and family. This could be a photo with your kids, spouse, or other loved ones.
– You don’t want acquaintances, co-workers or other casual contacts to see certain photos. A private cover photo allows you to customize visibility.
– You want to avoid getting inappropriate or unwanted comments from people you don’t know well on personal photos.
– You intend to use your cover photo space for professional branding but also want to upload personal photos you can look back on. A private photo is perfect for the latter.
– You post a lot of public content but like to maintain some privacy and exclusivity for certain things. A private cover photo is one way to achieve that.
Things to Note About Private Cover Photos
When making your Facebook cover photo private, here are some things you should be aware of:
– You will be the only one who can see your cover photo on your profile if you select Only Me. Others will simply see a blank or gray space in place of your cover image.
– Your existing cover photo will remain public until you upload a new private photo and save changes. It will not automatically turn private.
– When someone else views your profile, it will not indicate in any way that you have a private cover photo set. They will just see a blank space.
– If you want your cover photo visible to only some friends, you’ll have to create a friend list and customize the audience to that list.
– Your new posts and profile picture audience will not automatically change when you set a private cover photo. Those have separate audience selectors.
– You can change the audience back to Public at any time if you later decide to share your cover photo openly.
How to Set a Custom Audience for Your Cover Photo
Follow these steps if you want to set a custom audience for who can see your Facebook cover photo:
1. When uploading a new cover photo, click on Audience and choose “Custom” instead of Only Me or Friends.
2. A Custom window will open. Start typing the name of the friend list or individual friends you want to be able to see your cover photo.
3. Select the desired friend list or friends from the dropdown that appears. You can also choose to hide it from specific people.
4. Click Done once you have finished selecting the custom audience. It will save and apply this customized visibility.
5. To edit the custom audience later, just click on the audience selector again and change who can view your private cover photo.
Do Friends Get Notified of New Private Cover Photos?
No, friends who are not included in the audience of your private Facebook cover photo will not get any notification about you uploading a new cover photo.
The activity log that shows when you update your cover photo is only visible to the audience you select for that specific photo.
For friends, it will seem as if you simply removed your cover photo when you set a new private one they can’t see. They have no way of knowing you uploaded a photo only visible to a select audience.
Can Someone Share My Private Cover Photo Publicly?
No, the audience restriction you set for your Facebook cover photo cannot be overridden by anyone else.
If you set the audience to Only Me, no one else sees the photo at all. They would have no way to access it for sharing elsewhere.
Even for custom audiences like close friends and family, they are only able to see your private cover photo on your profile. Your photo will not be visible on their profiles or in their newsfeeds for them to share publicly.
So you can be assured that setting your cover photo audience to private will prevent it from being shared publicly or without your permission.
Should I Be Concerned About Facebook Storing My Private Photos?
It’s understandable to have concerns about privacy with Facebook storing your private cover photos on their servers. However, there are a few mitigating factors:
– Facebook’s privacy policy states they will not share your private, non-public content without your consent.
– They have strong security measures in place to prevent unauthorized access to stored user data including private photos.
– Your private cover photos are only visible on the Facebook platform to the audience you select.
– You can delete the photo at any time which removes it from their servers.
– Using stringent privacy settings greatly minimizes risks of data misuse. A private photo by definition has limited visibility.
While no system is completely foolproof, Facebook does appear to take reasonable precautions around storing users’ non-public photos securely. Just be thoughtful about the type of content you upload.
What Happens When I Make My Cover Photo Public Again?
If you change the audience setting back to Public after having a private cover photo for awhile, here is what will happen:
– The cover photo will immediately become visible to everyone again.
– Anyone who visits your profile will now be able to see your cover image.
– Some people may notice the change if they looked at your profile when you had a blank space and are now seeing the photo.
– For others, it will just seem like you uploaded a new cover photo as normal.
– People will be able to like, comment, share and otherwise interact with your public cover photo again.
– Going forward, any new cover photos you upload will default back to being public unless you change the audience again.
So it’s a fairly quick and seamless process to restore your cover photo visibility to public. Just be cognizant that people may now start interacting with the photo.
Can I See Insights on My Private Cover Photos?
Unfortunately, the Facebook insights feature that shows you details on how many people reacted, commented, shared your cover photo etc. does not work for private photos.
Since private cover photos are only visible to you and the audience you select, Facebook has no metrics to display for engagement.
You’ll only be able to view insights for your cover photos when they are public or shared with a large enough friend list that meaningful aggregate data can be shown.
So if you want to track performance, you’ll have to temporarily make your cover photo public again to be able to access the insights data.
Conclusion
Making your Facebook cover photo private is simple – just choose the Only Me or Custom audience option. This prevents unwanted visibility. Keep in mind friends won’t get notified and you lose insights on private photos. But you can always change the audience back to public at any time.
Carefully selecting who can see your cover image allows you to share personal photos safely while still showcasing public photos professionally. Adjust the privacy settings depending on your comfort level.