Facebook’s Trending news topic section is being removed at the beginning of next week, along with products and third-party integrations that rely on the Trending API.
Based on Facebook’s researched, people didn’t find it very useful over time. According to the company, the content in the Trending topics section accounted for fewer than 1.5 percent of clicks to news publishers on average.
“We’ve seen that the way people consume news on Facebook is changing to be primarily on mobile and increasingly through news video. So we’re exploring new ways to help people stay informed about timely, breaking news that matters to them, while making sure the news they see on Facebook is from trustworthy and quality sources,” writes Facebook’s head of news products, Alex Hardiman, on Facebook’s news blog.
New ways are being explored to surface news to users, which references the “Breaking News” label for news headlines. Facebook is testing a “Today In” section that pulls the latest breaking news from local publishers, officials and organizations.
Another reference Facebook is making is to the dedicated section in Watch for news video coverage: “Where people can view live coverage, daily news briefings and weekly deep dives that are exclusive to Watch.”