Confused about the new Facebook home page? While it should be pretty easy to use, there are a number of things that have changed that you should be aware of. Whether it’s a new location for the logout link, or hidden friend lists, many users still haven’t completely figured out the way the new Facebook home page works. In this guide we explain how to use the new home page and have a complete video tutorial included at the end.

Understanding The New Facebook Home Page Design

The new Facebook layout includes some major navigational changes among other things. Whether you can’t find a link that used to be there or there are new features that you haven’t seen, there are some key components to the new Facebook Homepage. As Facebook illustrates in their new homepage tour, there are 6 core components of the new home page: requests and notifications, news feed, bookmarked applications, online friends, account privacy and settings, birthday and event reminders, and Facebook chat.

New Search Location

Facebook has moved the search from the right hand side of the navigation bar and has made it more centralized. The purpose is to make searching a core component of the Facebook navigational process. While Facebook has suggested that they will be improving their search functionality in the near future, search is already an important feature. If you are looking for friends, Pages, or just looking to search what people are talking about on Facebook, you just type in what you need in the search box.

New Logout Button

Some users are confused about the location of the new logout button. It should be pretty easy to find, but if you are still searching for it, just click on “Account” and select “Logout” from the drop-down menu.

New Notifications Location

Facebook has also moved the notifications from the lower right to the top left of the site. While Facebook will be removing notifications from applications in the next two weeks, they now show up next to your notifications and requests. You can find more about this in the video below.

Change The Number Of Friends In Your Feed

Have more than 250 friends? If so, you may not be seeing all the stories from your friends. As was the case with the previous design, you can now click on “Most Recent” in your news feed and scroll down all the way to the bottom. From there click on “Edit Options” and change the number of friends that show up in your feed by changing the number in the box located under “Number of Friends”. I’ve increased mine to 500, however you can change yours to anywhere up to 5,000.

Prevent Your Friends From Viewing Your Application Activity

One of the most important things to take note of within the new Facebook home page, is the application and games dashboards. These areas enable you to view the application activity from your friends. That means they can see your application activity as well. Anytime you visit an application, it’s extremely likely that your visit will generate a feed story within the applications dashboard. In order to prevent your friends from viewing every application you’ve visited visit the applications and websites privacy settings page and then select “Only Me” under the setting “Activity on Applications and Games Dashboards” (pictured below).

Viewing Your News Feed By Friend List

One other feature that many users have had issues with is friend lists. While friend lists have not been removed, you need to click on the “Friends” icon in the left-sidebar in order to expand friend lists. Once expanded, you can view the feeds of any friend list. According to Facebook, friend lists were partially hidden because they were a “power user” feature. You can learn about this feature and many more in the video below.