How To Find Mutual Friends With The New Facebook Layout

I’ll admit it: I’m a bit of a Facebook stalker. And while the new Facebook layout took some getting used to in general, what really through me for a loop were changes to some seemingly small, yet very important, features. In particular, the ability to view mutual friends when browsing through profiles.

You used to be able to see these mutual friends easily displayed on a user’s profile, with one click to view more if you had lots in common. This made deciding whether to friend (or unfriend) people easily, since you could tell at a glance that you had 80 friends in common, or none.

Facebook hasn’t removed the mutual friend functionality, but it is a bit trickier to find. Now you must visit a user’s profile and click on the “Friends” link below their profile icon to view mutual friends. From there, click on the “Search By Name” dropdown and select “Mutual Friends” to see everyone you’re both connected to.

Easy? Yes. But not quite as easy as it used to be. This extra step makes you take a little extra time to dig around on Facebook, which is always their goal for the site. It also makes you harder to see people you’re already connected to, since Facebook wants to foster more new connections.

Hard to say why this change was made, but I love a good conspiracy theory. The fact that it takes more time and clicks to accomplish a simple task does not seem insignificant to me. But for now, just remember Friends>Search By Name>Mutual Friends.

What do you think about the new Facebook layout changes? What are you liking, or finding hard to navigate? Share your frustrations or favorite features in the comments below.