HispanicBusiness

Facebook announced a major revamp of its news feed feature Thursday, in a move the social networking giant said would give more choice and control to its 1 billion users.

The redesign of the news feed is the first major makeover of the core Facebook service since company founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg introduced the Timeline in late 2011.

Zuckerberg said the idea behind the revamp was to provide users with the "best personalized newspaper" experience.

He described the change as revolving around providing users with bigger images, multiple feeds divided into categories and a uniform look across mobile and PC devices.

The most striking visual difference is the increased prominence given to images which now comprise almost 50 per cent of items in the news feed, Zuckerberg said.

News items will also be divided into different categories with users able to choose feeds from friends, close friends, music, photos, games and from pages a user follows.

In a nod to Facebook's mobile apps the design will also feature a side navigation bar for a consistent look across all platforms.

Chris Cox, Facebook's vice president of product, said the new look would be rolled out to a small number of users starting Thursday, with tablet and smartphone versions to follow in the coming weeks.

"Because this is a big change on the web, we're going to be very careful and slow in how we move it out," Cox said. When the product is more "polished," it will be rolled out broadly.