How do I create a private, closed Facebook group?

I want to set up a private group on Facebook for my friends that works just like a regular Facebook group, but is only visible to us, not the general public at large. I also want to be able to approve members before they can join the list too. Can Facebook do that?

Dave's Answer:

You betcha! Facebook has lots of sophistication with group management and while it's not the easiest process in the world, you can definitely create a private or closed group on Facebook.

I recently set up the Facebook group for the Denver Film Critics Society, a group that is only intended for members of the society, not the general public at large. For us, it was okay that it be visible (after all, that's a wee bit of marketing) but we can't have non-members access our discussion as we're under various disclosure rules with the movie studios and advertising agencies.

Anyway, suffice to say, same situation, same challenge.

Here's how I did it. Take a deep breath, it's kinda complicated...

On the bottom of every page there's a Facebook navigational bar. One of the items on the bar is the "groups" feature:

Click on Groups and then on the top of the subsequent page, right next to the search box, you'll see a helpful button:

Click on "Create a New Group" and you'll jump right into a fairly complicated form that asks for all sorts of information about your new group. Fill it out as you see fit:

When you're ready, click on "Create Group" and you'll go to the first of a bunch of configuration and setting options:

For your private group, you might want to enable everything for members, but not for non-members. Don't worry about the privacy settings yet, that's still to come...

Scroll down a bit and you'll see the key options for a Facebook group: Open, Closed, and Secret:

Click on "Save" and your group is created and ready to rock. In fact, you can even let your friends know about it on your feed, if you'd like:

For a completely secret group, you might not want to do that, otherwise you'll have people you don't want as members asking about it (and knowing it exists in the first place).

If you do, however, Facebook will let you know that it worked and what happened:

Now the fun part. Who do you want in your group? Click on "Invite" then go through your list of Facebook friends to pick a few out:

Picked out the right folk? Great. Click on the "Invite" button at the bottom of the page and they'll get an invitation to the group.

Adding a Custom Graphic to your Facebook group

One thing that puzzled me when I set up my first Facebook group was how to add a custom icon so that it looks more snazzy? It's not too hard, but, again, you have to poke around a bit to find out the solution.

I'll take a shortcut. Since I did announce the creation of the group, there's a handy entry on my status updates that indicates as such:

To edit the group settings, I'll simply click on the group name in the update. Now I end up here:

Still, how do you change that darn picture??

The secret? Move your cursor over the current image and a new option pops up:

Ah ha! Click on that...

A number of options appear. Choose "Upload a Picture", and hopefully you already have a suitable Facebook Group friendly image ready to go...

My image is a PNG format graphic that's 136x79 in size, fairly small:

It's perfect for the task, so I choose it, then click "Upload" and...

That's it. Graphic associated with the new Facebook Group.

One final tip: if you want to point your friends directly to the group via an email or similar, just grab the URL from the main group page. For the Denver Film Critics Society group, it's http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=185574380926, as an example.

Hope that helps you out with Facebook groups. I also invite you to join our Facebook fan page too, while you're at it. :-)

Categorized: Facebook Help (Article 9204, Written by Dave Taylor)
Tagged: facebook, facebook groups, privacy, private groups, secret groups
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Comments

Great post, very detailed. We're going to create a private FB group for our clients at work, so I was doing a little research on it before I started and came across your post. Seems like you have a lot of good content here, I subscribed!

-Zack

Posted by: Zack at January 12, 2010 3:04 PM

Thank you SO MUCH for this detailed step by step with picture guide! You are amazing!

Posted by: Rebekah at May 2, 2010 9:50 AM

Hi Dave,

Long time reader, first time emailer...

Is it possible to make a private Facebook Page?

I want to communicate with members of a board of a non profit org about private issues.

A Group doesn't give us all of the functionality we want.

Thanks,
Josh

Posted by: Josh Fialkoff at July 20, 2010 10:40 PM

if you do make a closed group, can members turn around and share videos and content with non members? (I mean, sure, they could download and upload them if they want to go to the trouble, but can they click on the share button and post to their own wall and share with others?)

Posted by: Abe at September 29, 2010 7:55 AM

Is this still up to date? The only security option I get when creating a group is if its open, closed or secret. I cant even choose the category, not define if members can post, etc. Even my group being Secret, members, not administrators, can invite other people...I cant figure out if this is a bug or facebook has changed its application to a worse versison. Thank you!!

Posted by: Daniela at October 18, 2010 1:46 PM

yesterday i created a private group. the reason i created it is because i wanted to send a post to 15 of my 400 fb friends, to post on their walls. i now know that is not what a group does.

some of these people i included in the group were annoyed they were in a group without being approved by them or asked etc. i was annoyed too and i tried to delete the group by first deleting myself as the administrator which disabled me from having power over this group to do anything at all.

now the group is hanging out there in the facebook wormhole and i'd really really like to know how to make myself as the administrator again and delete the whole dang group. there is currently no administrator.

i think this is not clear with facebook and i see quite a few instances where facebook users in similar circumstances had these same concerns.

can you help me?? thanks.

Posted by: nina at October 29, 2010 10:31 AM

Hey,
I have an additional question about private groups. Are you able to invite people to a private group by email if you aren't a friend of theirs on Facebook?
Thanks!

Posted by: Laurie at January 28, 2011 1:18 PM

I'm relatively new to FB. I've created a couple of Groups, but I never jumped into some 'complicated form' as you posted. Just basic stuff with no controls other than open, closed, secret. Can you help?

Posted by: Don at February 6, 2011 3:27 PM

This is terrific information! Is it current? By that I mean is it from TODAY, March 4th, 2011 ... or has Facebook already changed the settings? How can I guarantee my group will be private?

Posted by: Pam at March 4, 2011 7:34 PM

Great info. Thanks for sharing! I have a question, if you are an adminstrator for a SECRET group, does this enable you to see how often and when the members in your group view it? I'm a mom and noticed my son is a member of SECRET group, which is a lttle concerning and want to monitor it without being caught

Posted by: Terri at March 6, 2011 6:22 PM

I've seen several explanations about how to set up a facebook group. None of them seem to fit my experience. My facebook page does not have a navigation bar at the bottom. However, in the upper left corner, just below "Edit My Profile" there is a place to pick "Create Group", which bring up a box with three thing to answer. The first is "Group Name". I know what that means. The third to choose privacy type. The second one, "Members", is confusing. There is no explanation of what to put here. Actually, there is a fourth pick: "Create" or "Cancel". Has facebook changed things, recently. I don't know what to do with this.

Posted by: Charles Stover at March 8, 2011 2:54 PM

How do I make my group/page private on the new facebook settings.. (@.@) I can't find the settings you've mentioned earlier (>.<)
Thanks!!

Posted by: Meimi at March 24, 2011 6:59 AM

A member I want to delete from a Facebook Group is not showing up on the members list. And he keeps taunting and abusing the group asking us Admins to remove him, which we can't because he is not showing up on the member list. And it seems like he is adding more vicious members to the group now and they are abusing members. The admins have reported to FB and when we block them we are not able to see their posts but the remaining group members can, and it's even tougher then! What is happening?

Posted by: Sujitha at August 18, 2011 6:24 PM

Sujitha, I am afraid I have no idea what's going on or how to help you. What if you create a new group and re-invite the people you want to be there, leaving the old group uninhabited?

Posted by: Dave Taylor at August 18, 2011 6:36 PM

Posted by: Ik at September 6, 2011 6:33 PM

Posted by: koukou at September 6, 2011 6:46 PM

I want to create a group but there isn't any navigation bar - There is menu option on the home page, but it requires members to be added at the time you create a group.

Posted by: Ron at September 7, 2011 10:51 AM

Thank you for this information, I have been wanting to do this for my beer club for quite some time, I believe now I have the tools. Thank you
Paul

Posted by: Paul at November 24, 2011 5:13 AM

Hi Dave

Hoping you can help; I've created a closed group and I am an Admin but the tab titled 'Invite' doesn't appear alongside the 'Customise', 'Officers' and 'Members' tabs.

Any ideas as to how I get to that part of the programme?

Cheers
Di

Posted by: Diane at January 2, 2012 3:15 PM

Okay, I didn't see anything that gave the option for open, private or secret when I created a family group. Can I change it to private now? or did I just screw up?
Cat

Posted by: Cathy Hill at February 5, 2012 9:50 PM

I have something to say, now that you mention it, but ...

I do have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but first I'd like to say thank you for all your efforts on this Web site by buying you a cup of coffee!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!