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What are Signal Stories?

Stories are photo, video, or text posts you share with a selected audience. They differ from messages in several key ways:
  • They expire automatically. Stories disappear 24 hours after you post them. Neither you nor your viewers need to delete them manually.
  • You choose who sees each story. You can share with all your Signal contacts, a custom list, or specific groups — and you can change this per story.
  • Replies go to your private inbox. When someone replies to your story or reacts to it, the reply arrives as a direct message, not a public comment.
  • Videos are capped at ~30 seconds per clip. Videos longer than 30 seconds are automatically split into sequential clips.
Stories is an optional feature. You can turn it off entirely in Signal Settings > Privacy > Stories if you prefer not to use it.

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Creating a story

1

Open the Stories tab

From the main screen, tap the Stories tab at the bottom of the app.
2

Tap the compose icon or your own story

Tap the + icon next to your name, or tap the camera/plus icon at the top of the Stories tab. A sheet appears asking you to choose the story type.
3

Choose what to share

Select a photo or video from your gallery, or tap the camera to capture one now. You can annotate images with text, drawings, or the blur tool before posting.
Tap Text to create a text-only story. Type your text (up to 700 characters, up to 13 lines), choose a background colour or gradient, and select a font style.
4

Choose who sees it

Before posting, select the distribution:
  • My Story — your default story list (configurable in story settings).
  • Custom lists — one or more distribution lists you have created.
  • A group — any Signal group you are a member of.
You can post the same story to multiple destinations at once.
5

Post

Tap Send or the story send button. Your story is posted and will disappear after 24 hours.

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Story privacy and distribution lists

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My Story audience

By default, My Story is visible to all your Signal contacts. You can restrict this.
1

Go to story settings

Tap the Stories tab, then tap the overflow menu (three dots) or go to Signal Settings > Privacy > Stories.
2

Tap My Story

This opens the My Story privacy settings.
3

Set who can see your story

Choose one of:
  • All Signal connections — anyone you have an active conversation with.
  • Only share with — a custom allowlist of specific contacts.
  • Exclude — everyone except contacts you specify.

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Creating a custom distribution list

Custom distribution lists let you maintain named groups for story sharing (separate from group chats).
1

Open story settings

Tap Stories > overflow menu > Story settings, or go to Settings > Privacy > Stories.
2

Tap New story

Tap + New story or the new-story button.
3

Select Custom list

Choose New custom story, give it a name, and select the contacts who should receive it.
4

Save

Tap Done or Create. The list now appears as a destination when you post a story.
Distribution lists are one-directional — members of a custom list do not know they are on it, and they cannot see who else is on the list.

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Group stories

You can post a story directly into a Signal group. All current members of the group see the story. The story still expires after 24 hours. To post to a group story, select the group as the destination when creating your story.

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View receipts for stories

If you enable View receipts, you can see who viewed your story. Go to Settings > Privacy > Stories and toggle View receipts on or off. This setting is mutual — if you turn it off, you also cannot see view counts on others’ stories.

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Viewing others’ stories

1

Open the Stories tab

Stories from your contacts and groups appear here. Unviewed stories show a coloured ring.
2

Tap a story to open it

Stories play automatically one after another. Tap the right side of the screen to skip to the next story; tap the left side to go back. Tap anywhere to pause.
3

Swipe up to reply

Swipe up or tap the reply field at the bottom of the story to send a private message to the poster. Your reply is delivered to their Signal inbox as a direct message.

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Reacting to stories

1

While viewing a story, tap the emoji icon

An emoji picker appears at the bottom of the screen.
2

Choose a reaction emoji

Tap any emoji to send it. The reaction is delivered to the story poster as a direct message reaction.
Story reactions and replies are private messages between you and the poster. Other viewers cannot see them.

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Hiding and muting stories

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Hiding a contact’s story

If you no longer want to see stories from a specific contact, you can hide them. Their stories still exist — they are just moved out of your main feed.
1

Long-press the story in the Stories tab

A context menu appears.
2

Tap Hide story

The contact’s stories are hidden from your Stories tab. You can unhide them from Settings > Privacy > Stories or by visiting the contact’s profile.

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Removing someone from your story audience

To prevent a specific contact from seeing your My Story posts, open Settings > Privacy > Stories > My Story and set their visibility to excluded. This does not notify the contact.

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Turning off Stories entirely

If you prefer not to use Stories at all:
1

Go to Settings > Privacy > Stories

2

Tap Turn off stories

Confirm when prompted. Your existing stories are deleted and the Stories tab is hidden from the main screen.
You can re-enable Stories at any time from the same settings screen.