Some months back, we published an article on how you can send and receive Facebook messages on your Android device without the Messenger app. Unfortunately, you needed to downgrade to an older version of Facebook app to make it work.
The method still works for the Facebook version mentioned in the post but the problem is that new features have been added to the app since and using an older version may not really work for some. There are several reasons you may not really want to use the official Messenger app:
- The regular Facebook app can still send and receive messages. Facebook just decided you should install a separate app for messaging.
- There’s an increased battery drain using Facebook Messenger. You have the main thread and background services constantly running.
- An extra app running in the background means a load on CPU and RAM.
There are two different ways to receive messages on Facebook without Messenger app.
Using Facebook Chat Enabler Reborn
This app works like the one mentioned here but it’s a lot better since it works with more recent versions of Facebook app. When you open the app, it suggests which version of Facebook Chat Enabler to use. All you need to do is just hit the download button and install the dummy Messenger when prompted.
One scary thing about this app is the permissions required to work. The developer explained that the app is actually the original Facebook Messenger stripped to nothing and for some reasons, its manifests can’t be edited and had to remain untouched to make it look like the real thing. The app is never executed by the system and doesn’t require root access.
The explanation sounds legit and the app looks safe to use. I’m currently using it with the Facebook version 48 but there are reports it works up to version 55. Whether it works with the latest version is something you may need to find out. Either way, you can grab an older version here.
It works as advertised and brings back messaging to your Facebook app. It only leaves an icon on your app drawer which you can move to an unused folder or hide with a custom launcher. You can download and find the support forum here.
Using Facebook Lite
Unknown to a lot of people, there’s a lite version of Facebook app that’s only about 1MB.
It probably won’t do all things the real app lets you do but if all you want to do is check your news feed and manage messages without the Mesenger app, you probably need it. The UI isn’t so attractive though. You can download directly from Play Store here.