Free Chrome extension

Is this Facebook group worth joining?

Short answer

Open any Facebook group and Group Scout grades it from what is already on screen — posts a day, how many get answered, and roughly how many buying posts a month it produces. No login, no account, no server call. Membership count is the number everyone checks and the one that matters least.

What it grades

Posts a day

Counted from the feed in front of you, not estimated from membership. A 900-member local group routinely out-posts a 50,000-member national one.

Who answers

The share of posts that get a real reply. A group where questions die unanswered is a group where your reply will die too.

Buying posts a month

How many posts a month actually ask to hire or buy. This is the only number that decides whether the group is a channel or a hobby.

A verdict

Worth joining, worth watching, or worth leaving — in one line, with the numbers that produced it shown underneath.

How to use it

  1. 1

    Open a group

    Any facebook.com/groups page. One you are in, or one you are deciding whether to join.

  2. 2

    Scroll a little

    Scout reads the posts the page has rendered. Twenty or thirty posts is enough for the numbers to settle; fewer and it tells you it could not judge.

  3. 3

    Read the panel

    It grades what it counted and shows the arithmetic, so you can disagree with the verdict on the evidence rather than on faith.

  4. 4

    Decide, then watch the keepers

    Groups that score well are the ones worth pointing HuddleWatch at. Groups that do not are the ones to leave, which is most of them.

What it does not do

Your Facebook loginNever asked for. There is no sign-in.
Where the reading happensIn your browser, on the page you opened. No request leaves it.
Posting, commenting, messagingNone. It has no write access to anything.
Data storedNothing. Close the tab and the grade is gone.
PriceFree, permanently.

Frequently asked questions

Is Group Scout free?

Yes, and it stays free. It grades groups; HuddleWatch is the paid product that watches them around the clock and scores every new post for buying intent.

Does it need my Facebook password?

No. It has no login, no account and no server call. It reads the group page already rendered in your own browser and does the arithmetic there. Nothing leaves the page.

Does it work on private groups?

It works on any group page you can already see. If you are a member of a private group, the posts are on your screen and Group Scout can count them. It cannot see groups you have not joined — nothing can.

Will it post, comment or message anyone?

No. It reads. It has no ability to write anything to Facebook, which is also why it cannot put your account at risk.

How is this different from HuddleWatch?

Group Scout answers “is this group worth my time?” once, from a page you have open. HuddleWatch answers “did anyone in my groups just ask for what I sell?” continuously, from our servers, with every post scored 0–100. Scout is how you pick the groups; HuddleWatch is what watches them.

How accurate is the grade?

It is as accurate as the posts on screen. Scroll further before grading and the numbers settle. Where the page does not give it enough to judge, it says so rather than printing a confident zero.

Grading is the easy half

Once you know which groups are worth it, something has to read them at 3am. HuddleWatch watches from its own member accounts and scores every post 0–100 before deciding whether to interrupt you.

Start watching your groups