Why Can't I Tag Someone on Facebook? How To Get Facebook Photo Tagging Right

Facebook photo privacy is a tricky thing.

On the one hand, you want to make yourself as accessible as possible, so that new friends and followers can find you, and you can expand your network.

On the other hand, though, you don't necessarily want to give up all your privacy - and as useful as features like facial recognition can be, they can also feel just a teensy bit creepy.

That's why it's so important to know exactly how Facebook's different features work.‍

And one of the most important ones to understand is tagging.

‍You probably came to this page because you're wondering - why can't I tag someone on Facebook?

Tagging users and Pages in photos and status updates is a perfectly convenient way to make sure they get noticed - or get credit!But there are a lot of weird little rules and settings regarding how to tag on Facebook, including differences between what you can do as a person and what you can do as a Page.(Even for pros, it can get kind of confusing.)

So right now, it's time for a quick refresher on how to tag someone in a post on Facebook, how to enable tagging on Facebook, and what you can and can't do when tagging people and Pages.

Let's take a look!

For starters...

Why can't I tag someone on Facebook?

Because anyone can tag a Page - but tagging a person doesn't always work.

Using default privacy settings, Facebook profiles can someone on Facebook, and they can tag Pages - whether or not they've liked that those Pages.(So you can tag Vin Diesel's Facebook Page in your Chronicles of Riddick fan art, even if you haven't yet followed it.)If you're a Page, though, the rules about how to tag on Facebook are a little different - and a LOT trickier.

‍For example, your Facebook Page can tag people in its videos or photos - but only if that person has liked your Page.

‍If your profile is Facebook friends with someone, though, you can tag them on your own Facebook Page's photos or videos, even if they haven't liked that Page! (See? Tricky!)

Tag Review

It gets a little more complicated when you factor in Facebook's options for reviewing tags.

Not everybody wants to be tagged in things without a little warning - or without having some say in the visibility of those tags.

That's why Facebook has two different options for reviewing tags and controlling their visibility.(And they have VERY similar names, so pay close attention to this part!)

‍Tag review is when you (a Facebook user) get notified anytime someone tries to add a tag to one of your Facebook posts. You receive that notification before the tag is approved for public view, so you get to decide whether or not the tag is allowed.

‍Timeline review is when you (a Facebook user) get notified anytime someone tags you in a post. You are then allowed to decide whether or not the post with that tag appears in your own Timeline. The important differentiator is that Facebook timeline review is not how to remove a tag on Facebook.

The photo is still tagged but it is not on your timeline.(And don't forget, people can always untag themselves from photos and videos after you tag them - even if they previously approved of the tag.)That's just what Facebook profiles can control - and just like before, the way this stuff works with Pages is just a little bit different.

Pages have a LOT more control over who can tag them

While Facebook profiles have tools like tag review and timeline review, they don't have the option to completely prevent being tagged in the first place.

Pages, on the other hand, DO have that option.

‍Nobody can tag your Facebook Page unless you want them to - nor can they tag the media your Page uploads.

‍On your Facebook Page, go to settings, and you'll see these options:

If you want to upload photos without allowing people to tag them, you have that option - and you can prevent people from tagging your Page altogether, if you want.(Just keep in mind that tagging is an easy way for people to create links from their updates to your Page, and that by preventing tagging altogether, you're limiting their ability to send people in your direction!)

Now, when it comes specifically to images, there's another big difference between how tags work for profiles and how they work for Pages:

Your Facebook Page doesn’t aggregate photos that it’s been tagged in

When you look at the Photos tab of your Facebook profile, you'll see sections labeled Albums, Your Photos, and Photos of you.

That last one is where Facebook aggregates the images you've been tagged in, regardless of who uploaded and/or tagged them.

Your Facebook Page, on the other hand, doesn't have one of these.

‍It still has albums and places for automatically organizing things like your profile pictures and cover photos, but it doesn't aggregate and display images in which other people have tagged your Page.

So while it may make you a tiny bit nervous to think that people could be out there tagging your Page in random photos without your consent, don't worry - your fans aren't likely to see those pictures anyway, unless they're friends with whoever is posting them.

With all this stuff in mind regarding how to tag on Facebook, then, you should always remember this last lesson when you tag friends on Facebook:

Can I tag someone on Facebook?

The answer to whether or not you can tag someone on Facebook depends almost entirely on THEM.

If there's one thing to learn from all of this, it's that Facebook's tagging rules are complicated.

They change whether you're tagging an image or an update, whether you're friends with a person, whether that person has liked a certain Page, whether you're doing it as a profile or as a Page, and so on, and so on.

Most importantly, the rules of how to tag on Facebook change depending on what a user wants.

You might tag someone on Facebook, but it doesn't show up because they removed the tag.

Maybe you're trying to tag a Page in an update, but it's not working because that Page doesn't allow others to tag it.

Maybe you tried to tag your own Page on someone else's photo, but they have tag review turned on and rejected it.

You can't always know what someone's settings are in advance - so don't let tagging stress you out!

Ultimately, it's one of those "try and see if it works" sorts of things. You can control your own settings, but you can't predict all the variables when it comes to someone or something else - and that's okay.

So the question is not: how do you tag someone in a post on Facebook? The real question is: do you allow people to tag YOUR Facebook Page?

Final Thoughts

As we saw, you can prevent people from tagging the media your Page posts, and you can prevent them from tagging your Page at all - so what's YOUR stance on it?

Do you give people carte blanche for the sake of being as connected as possible? Do you play it super safe? Or is it somewhere in between? Tell us what you think in the comments below!

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