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We all have regrets.
Perhaps they were unkind words, sent in the heat of the moment. Perhaps they were career-ending statements sent out of frustration. Or maybe they were professions of love, sent after way too many drinks. Or they could have been unflattering photos you never meant to send. Or maybe you sent a message to the wrong person.
Oops!
If you’ve ever wanted to take back things you’ve sent, you’ll appreciate a coming update to Facebook Messenger that will let you delete messages within 10 minutes of sending them.
Deleting Messages on Facebook Messenger
With the upcoming update, you’ll be able to delete messages in Facebook Messenger so they disappear from your Messenger as well as the inbox of the recipient(s) of your message. You will be able to delete photos, messages with text or other messages to send to others using Facebook Messenger, within 10 minutes of sending the message.
How This Delete Feature in Messenger Came to Be
In April of this year, Tech Crunch reported that Mark Zuckerberg (CEO of Facebook) was found to be deleting some of his messages from Facebook Messenger. Facebook Retracted Zuckerberg’s Messages from Recipients’ Inboxes.
Perhaps to quell the outrage at this news, Facebook started working on updating Messenger to give the delete feature to all its users.
One report on Twitter last month announced that the delete feature for Messenger was in the works:
Facebook Messenger is finally working on “Unsend Message” in the app for everyone!
Tip @Techmeme pic.twitter.com/5OtQrmyID3
— Jane Manchun Wong (@wongmjane) October 12, 2018
Facebook Messenger Delete Update Coming Soon
Last week Facebook released an update to the Messenger app for iPhone and iPad that promised the delete feature was coming soon.
Specifically, the Messenger iOS app update states:
Coming soon: Remove a message from a chat thread after it’s been sent. If you accidentally send the wrong photo, incorrect information, or message the wrong thread, you can easily correct it by removing the message within 10 minutes of sending it.”
Facebook has not given any information about exactly when this delete feature will be coming, but by announcing the feature in its most recent Messenger app update, Facebook is probably nearing its release.
What Else You Need to Know About Facebook Messenger Delete Feature
While this new delete feature may sound like a helpful way to save us from our mistakes, you should know about its limitations before you start relying on it to undo your mistakes…
Beware! Delete ≠ Unsend
A word of caution: This new feature coming to Messenger is not an “Unsend” feature. After a message has been sent on Messenger the message will appear in the inbox of the recipient. The sender will have 10 minutes to delete that message from Messenger.
Unlike unsend, this 10 minute delete window doesn’t mean that Messenger will wait 10 minutes to send the message. Instead, it means that the message will arrive in the recipient’s Messenger inbox, then the sender has a window of 10 minutes to delete that message.
During that 10 minutes, the recipient may read the message. Unlike unsend, the delete feature in Messages does not guarantee that the message will be deleted before the recipient reads it.
=> Don’t miss Gmail Undo Send – Saving You from Your Mistakes
Beware of Screenshots
If the message can be read, then , a screenshot of the message can be taken before that message gets deleted. You may think that a message has been deleted from Messenger forever, but forever is a mighty long time.
As too many people have learned the hard way, deleting something rarely means it’s gone forever in the tech world.
Your Thoughts
Have you ever regretted sending something on Facebook Messenger? Are you looking forward to the delete feature coming soon to Messenger? Do you wish Messenger were introducing an unsend feature instead?
Share your thoughts in the Comments section below!
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*Facebook Messenger app image (edited) courtesy of Kārlis Dambrāns via Flickr and Creative Commons
This would be great, although I thought it would be all stored somewhere.
I think i’d use it regularly as a function to correct my poor spelling on messenger haha! Great read, thank you!
Hi Scott, I’m so pleased you enjoyed this article. Yes, if you don’t want to preserve your misspellings, you can delete them from Facebook Messenger, within 10 minutes.
You’re right, Facebook still may store messages somewhere, or share information with advertisers, so don’t put anything too embarrassing on Facebook Messenger, even if you can delete messages!
Hi Carolyn,
I was waiting for Facebook to come up with this delete feature since WhatApps introduced it. It gives bit of respite for users to delete messages which they didn’t intended to send. However, as you said in this post, it is not a unsend feature so recipient can read it if you delay the delete feature.
Thanks for sharing this post. Have a great day. 🙂
Hi Tarique, Yes, this delete feature has the potential to create more problems than it solves, if someone deletes a message after it has been seen or maybe captured on a screenshot. Best not to rely on it too much to get you out of a jam.
It will indeed be a welcome development if Facebook can implement this feature as soon as possible.
I was once a victim of sending message to the wrong person and it nearly cost me my relationship.
Just like WhatsApp, they should also increase the minutes.
Like what you said that we should be careful of the message being captured on screenshot, that is another scary part of it. But let them implement it first, then, we can find a way to solve it.
Thanks for this post.
Hi Charles, Yes, Facebook is starting to roll out this feature, so look for it soon. There is a danger that people will assume that because they delete messages the recipient won’t have seen them, but that may not be the case…