The Facebook app for Android is preparing some big new features. We’ve been able to get our hands on some new features coming to Facebook’s Android app including dark mode, a coronavirus tracker, and more.
Dark mode has been rolling out to Android apps for months at this point, but Facebook’s main app has resisted, despite other apps from the company — Facebook Lite, Messenger, and Instagram — adding support. There have been random hints here or there of dark mode support, but never a full rollout of the feature.
Below, you can see screenshots of what the stable dark mode for Facebook’s Android app looks like. The feature will offer a manual toggle as well as the ability to follow Android 10’s system-wide toggle. The version we’re seeing here seems mostly complete, showing up on settings pages, posts, and the home feed as well. The dark mode uses both dark grays and nearly-black shades, also using Facebook’s blue accent color and white when switching to this mode. Sadly, though, there’s no indication on when this will be available.
Another feature Facebook is working on for its Android app is a tracker for local coronavirus cases. An example below shows mock data from Seattle. The tracker shows cases over the course of three weeks and wider county-wide cases over the course of seven days. There’s also data at the top of the page that shows confirmed cases globally.
Facebook is also working on a refreshed UI for the “Time on Facebook” feature. This digital wellbeing-esque feature keeps track of how long a user actively uses the Facebook app on a weekly basis, with options to better use the app’s settings to manage that time.
The refreshed UI for “Time on Facebook” would introduce a grid-based UI that better separates the different sections. From what we can tell, there are no new features here, it’s just a UI revamp. Though, the “Quiet Mode” name is new despite the underlying functionality existing in the app already.
It’s unclear when any of these features will roll out publicly.
Dylan Roussel contributed to this article.
More on Facebook:
- Facebook’s Google Photos transfer tool is now available worldwide
- Facebook Gaming launches on Android as a game-streaming rival to YouTube, Twitch
- Facebook for Android starts rolling out bottom bar interface
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