What You Need to Know About the New Facebook Reactions

Did a friend's family pet pass away? Or did someone recently go through a breakup? Sometimes a "like" on these Facebook posts don't warrant a "thumbs up," so beginning today, the social media company has allowed users to react in new ways.

The "Dislike" button is still not available, but the new options -- simply named "reactions," let users express a host of more appropriate emotions: "love," "haha," "wow," "sad," and "angry." Each reaction is followed by a matching emoticon (the thumbs up still constitutes a like). 

To use the new feature, desktop users can hover over the like button. On mobile devices, users can access the new options by holding down the like button.  

Sammi Krug, Facebook's product manager, shares in a press release, "we understand that this is a big change, and want to be thoughtful about rolling this out. For more than a year we have been conducting global research including focus groups and surveys to determine what types of reactions people would want to use most."

As with the the former "Like" button, these reactions will help to show Facebook what content you want to see in your Newsfeed. We give that a hearty thumbs up!