We’ve been hearing for a few weeks now that Facebook was bringing multiple account support on over to their Messenger service. As of Saturday, it’s now official. Facebook announced on their Messenger page that you can now login to multiple accounts in the Messenger app on Android. Unfortunately for iOS users, it doesn’t appear to be making its way to iOS just yet. That may change in the future though. Messenger talks about how people share their phones and tablets with other family members and friends everyday. So now you’ll be able to quickly switch accounts at the tap of a button.
Facebook also points out that when you first sign in and decide you want to switch accounts, you will need to login with your username and password. Once the account is added, you’ll be able to simply switch to the account pretty easily. Making it great for everyone that has multiple accounts. Facebook also notes that users won’t receive notifications from other accounts that are part of the app. Something we saw with Instagram – also owned by Facebook – after it introduced multiple user support. Where users that shared an account were getting notifications from the other users’ personal account. A pretty big privacy breach there. Which Facebook says won’t happen with Messenger. We’ll have to wait and see on that one.
The company says that the feature is live now, so it appears that there is no app update needed here. Simply go into Settings and go under “Accounts” to add your other accounts or to switch between the accounts that you have on the app. It is definitely going to be convenient, especially for those that share smartphones or tablets. However, it’s worth noting that this won’t keep other users from accessing your account. Since you can switch without needing the password after the first time. So if there’s someone else using your phone or tablet who might be a bit nosey, it’s likely a good idea to just go ahead and log out of your account entirely. However, if you have multiple accounts, this will make everything much easier.