Facebook preview problems

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Usually, when you paste a link into a Facebook status message, it brings up a preview with an image, headline, and some text. Here is what to do if this doesn’t happen or it looks wrong:

  1. Make sure the WordPress post/page has a Featured Image
    FeaturedImage

  2. Make sure the Featured Image is big enough

    • It has to be at least 200 x 200 pixels for Facebook to use it
    • If it’s smaller than 600 x 315 px, Facebook will show a small thumbnail instead of a full-width image

  3. Make sure the Featured Image is not too big

    • The image has to be under 8 MB for Facebook to use it
    • To check the image size:
      1. Click on “Media” in the left hand menu
        medialibrary_menu-link
      2. Click on the image
        medialibrary_thumbnail
      3. Look for “File Size” in the upper right of the popup
        media_file-size
        It should be less than 8 MB (KB are less than MB – if the size is measured in KB, it is small enough)

  4. Check the debugger

    1. Visit the Facebook debugger, enter the URL of the post you’re trying to share, and click the “Debug” buttondebugger_main
    2. There should be a post preview with the image.
      fb_debugger_linkpreview

      • If it doesn’t look right, click the “Scrape Again” button (under the “When and how we last scraped the URL” heading)
        fb_debugger_scrapeagain
    3. If you still don’t see a good preview with the image:
      • Go to the Batch Invalidator (tab at the top of the page)
        fb-debugger_batchinvalidator
      • Enter the URL of the post you’re trying to sharefb-debugger_submitbatchinvalidator
      • Click the “Debug” button
      • Go back to the “Sharing Debugger” tab, enter the post URL and click “Debug” again to see if it worked
    4. Try sharing the URL again on Facebook