Top 15 Facebook Messenger Story Tips and Tricks

Temporary stories have taken over the world. Whether it’s Instagram, WhatsApp, YouTube, Facebook or Facebook Messenger – stories have made an impact everywhere. That’s because the stories are engaging, addictive, and incredibly easy to create.

Messenger stories made their debut as Messenger Day and were later renamed stories to remove any ambiguity between Facebook and Messenger stories. Since then, Facebook has natively supported cross-posting of stories between Facebook and Messenger. However, that doesn’t mean you have the same features.

Facebook and Messenger stories differ in many ways. We’ve already covered the tips and tricks of Facebook stories. So here we are going to tell you how to use Facebook Messenger stories like a pro with these tips and tricks.

Lets start.

1. Pause Story

Stories across all platforms play like a slide show and appear one after another automatically. Sometimes the story is so beautiful that we want to enjoy it with our heart and soul. In such cases, you can pause a story. To do this, tap and hold the screen to pause the story.

2. Change Story

Tap on the right side of the story to quickly jump to the next story from the same person and tap on the left side to go back. Swipe left on the screen to switch the story completely to the next person. And swipe right to view the previous person’s story. With these gestures, you don’t have to torture yourself to see all the stories.

3. Quickly Switch Camera

Touching the camera icon to switch between front or back is sometimes inconvenient. Alternatively, you can switch between cameras by double-tapping the screen – it works in photo and video mode.

4. Zoom In While Recording

Another troublesome thing when creating a story is the zoom feature on videos. You can use the pinch gesture to zoom in, but you have to use two fingers for that. To make it easier, you can hold the record button while recording and swipe up and down to zoom in and out.

5. Change Font

Unlike Instagram and WhatsApp, which allow you to change the font, the feature is currently absent in Messenger stories. However, if you want to change the font, there are two ways to do it.

Method 1

Open the picture in Facebook story and tap the Aa icon at the top and then type the text. Then tap the font style name to switch between the various fonts.

Note:

Method 2

You can use websites like Cool Symbol and Lingojam to create fancy font styles. Write the text on these sites, copy the generated text in unique fonts and paste it into a Messenger story.

6. Change Text Background

To do this, first tap the Aa icon in a Messenger story. Then tap the A icon repeatedly to change the transparency. Choose a color from the color palette below.

Pro Tip

7. Change Pen Size

Besides changing the font size, you can also adjust its thickness by changing the pen size. For this, tap the doodle icon and choose a pen color from the colors below.

Then you have to tap the selected color repeatedly to change the pen size. You will notice that the white border around the color changes depending on the pen size. Once you have the pen size you want, draw on the picture.

8. Draw with emojis

Instead of drawing with colored pencils, you can enrich the visuals by drawing on your pictures with emojis. To do this, tap the doodle icon, then the emoji icon. Then choose the emoji you want from the list below and start drawing on the picture.

9. Flip Stickers

Sure, you can rotate and enlarge the sticker size, but sometimes you can flip the stickers to create a fun effect. After adding it to your story, double-tap the sticker to flip it.

Pro Tip

10. Crop Image

What I love about Messenger stories is that you can easily rotate and crop both old and new pictures.

After adding a photo to your story, tap the crop icon and adjust the border to the size you want. Interestingly, you can even choose a predefined size from the available options. Just tap the size icon on the crop screen.

11. Add a Fancy Border

You can add fancy borders as well as add face filters to customize your stories. Swipe the picture right or left after you take it or choose one from your gallery. Alternatively, tap the emoji icon and then the Filters option.

12. Add Face Filters to Old Pictures

Face filters for new photos are easily available on the camera screen. But what if you want to add a filter to an old image like your childhood photo? You can do this in Messenger stories.

To do this, create a story using an old photo. Then, if the app detects a face in the image, you’ll get a new effect icon on the edit screen. Tap on it and choose a filter from the available options. You can post it to your story or save it to your device by tapping the Save icon.

13. Color Block Story

In Instagram, WhatsApp and Facebook stories, you can hold any color in the color palette to fill the screen. It works differently for Messenger stories.

In a Messenger story, tap the color palette icon in the camera view. Then on the next screen, use the color icon at the bottom to cycle through the various colors. Then you can use the usual story tools like pens, text and stickers to customize your story.

14. Mute and Unmute Story

Facebook Messenger isn’t just limited to your Facebook friends. Anyone on Facebook can message you. Often these go into the Message Requests folder. However, if you have interacted with or plan to do so with someone outside of your friends list, their stories will appear in the story list in Messenger.

To avoid watching these stories, you usually avoid touching the story icon. However, if you tap any of the stories before the one you want to avoid, those stories are still part of the slideshow. What will you do then? Do not worry. Use the mute or hide option to avoid such stories. When you do this, these stories will not appear in the story tray or slideshow. Say goodbye to unwanted comments.

To mute or hide a story, tap and hold the profile picture icon with a live story. Select Hide story from the menu. Alternatively, open the story you want to mute and tap the three-dot icon in the top-right corner. Select Mute story.

Note:

Tap your profile picture icon on the Messenger home screen to unmute or unhide stories.

Then tap Story, then tap Stories You Mute. Remove the people whose stories you want to watch from here.

15. Privacy Settings

Muting stories saves your eyes unnecessary suffering. But there’s one more problem – your stories may also be tracked by your Messenger connections, depending on the privacy setting.

To limit your stories to only your Facebook friends or private people, you need to change it in the privacy settings. To do this, press the profile picture icon on the Messenger home screen.

Then tap Story and set the privacy to your preference.

Bring out your Inner Artist

Messenger stories can be used as mini photo editors. While they may lack the powerful features found in photo editing apps, that doesn’t mean you can’t create great social media friendly graphics. Also, you can’t make highlights as it’s only possible through the Facebook app.

As you can see, Messenger stories are packed with great features. Ultimately, it all depends on how you use these creative tools to create different stories. So let that hidden artist experiment on the stories that disappeared after twenty-four hours and sit in the archives.

Next up: Struggling with Facebook Messenger or just a little underwhelming? Do not worry. Check out our 13 kick-ass Facebook Messenger tips and tricks for Android.