Facebook Link Preview Not Showing? Check These Layers

Inspect the exact URL in Sharing Debugger

Open Facebook Sharing Debugger and enter the full URL you shared. Sign in if required. Inspect the reported warnings and fetched information. If a re-scrape control is available, use it after you correct the page.

A correct homepage result does not establish that an article or product URL works. Follow any redirect and check which page and image Facebook reports. Keep the outcome separate from what your own browser or a different tool displays.

The debugger alternatives guide explains how a multi-platform metadata checker fits alongside Meta's tool. Proovd does not clear Facebook's cache or read its stored preview.

Make sure the page is publicly fetchable

Open the page without signing in, then fetch its HTML response if you have terminal access:

curl -sS -L -D - 'https://example.com/article'

Check whether you receive the article, a login page, or a security interstitial. If Meta reports a fetch failure but your browser works, inspect hosting and firewall events for the actual request. A 403 or rate limit is an access problem, not an instruction to redesign your image.

Use the Cloudflare crawler guide when that service sits in front of your site. Avoid blanket security changes based only on an image missing from a post.

Check the metadata and the image separately

Read the page response for its title, description, image URL, and object URL. If it returns homepage metadata for a product page, follow the shared default metadata guide. If the values appear only after JavaScript runs, inspect the React rendering workflow.

Open the exact image URL without cookies. An expired signature, protected storage object, or HTML file viewer can prevent fetching. The image URL guide covers those cases before you investigate dimensions.

Use Proovd to inspect the public metadata as a separate check. Its supported-platform simulations do not constitute a Facebook publishing test.

If Facebook shows the old image

Confirm the new image URL is present in the deployed HTML. If it is not, clearing Facebook's stored result cannot make it discover a value your website is not serving.

After updating the page, request a new scrape through Meta's debugger where available and inspect the reported result. An already published post can behave differently from a new share. Do not promise that re-scraping updates every historical post.

For an image replaced at the same URL, your own CDN may still serve old bytes. Inspect that response too. Versioning an asset filename can make a change easier to identify, but it still requires the page to reference the new asset. See the cache troubleshooting guide for the broader workflow.

If the debugger is correct but publication is not

Compare a fresh direct share with the context that fails: a scheduled post, comment, group, or another publishing tool. Record whether the image is absent while composing or disappears after publishing. These observations help separate a website fetch issue from platform or publishing behaviour.

If you use a publishing service, compare its own guidance with the final post. Sprout documents preview differences after publication, including access and metadata considerations.

At that point, changing correct website tags repeatedly may add confusion. Save the exact URL, debugger result, affected publishing context, and a screenshot for the platform or publishing provider. No independent checker can guarantee how Facebook will present every link in every context.