The best Snapchat tips, tricks, and Easter eggs

Turn on Travel Mode if you're worried about Snapchat using too much of your phone's data plan. You can find it under "Manage" in your settings.

One of Snapchat's many quirks is the list of emojis it puts next to your friends' names. They're called Friend Emojis. Here's what they mean:

Here's what they mean:

?? Gold Heart: Congrats, you are best friends with this person on Snapchat. You both send the most snaps to each other.
?? Red Heart: You both have been each others best friend on Snapchat for at least two weeks.
?? Pink Hearts: Things are getting serious. You both have been each others best friend on Snapchat for at least two months.
?? Grimace: This one is a little sneaky. It means that you share a best friend with the someone. So their best friend is the same as your best friend.
?? Smile: This means that the person is one of the people you message on Snapchat most frequently. But they're not your best friend.
?? Sunglasses: If you see sunglasses next to someone's name, you share a close friend on Snapchat with this person. It usually means that you're running in the same friend group.
?? Smirk: This indicates a one-way relationship, and you're the taker. This person sends you enough snaps to make you one of their best friends, but you don't send them many snaps back.
?? Fire: Ah, the infamous "Snapstreak." This "appears next to the numbers of days that you and a friend have snapped each other," according to Snapchat. "If you AND your friend don't both send a Snap within 24 hours, you will lose your Snapstreaks."
?? Hourglass: This is a warning that you're about to lose a "Snapstreak" with someone.
?? Baby: Congrats, you just became Snapchat friends with this person.
?? Birthday Cake: It's this person's birthday on Snapchat.

You can read each Friend Emoji's description and create custom ones under "Manage" in your settings.

In settings you can choose to let anyone send you messages (if they know your username) or just people you mutually follow. You can also change whether you want your Story to be visible to anyone who adds you, or only people you add back. The custom setting lets you block specific people from seeing your Story (but they can still message you like normal).

A Snapstreak between you and a friend is designated by a number that tells you both how many consecutive days you've snapped each other. The Hourglass emoji warns you when your streak with someone is about to end.

The colored icons to the left of your friends' names are indicators of the kinds of messages being sent and whether they've been opened already or not.

These two icons are important to understand when you're chatting with someone:

Tap the icon at the top left of the screen in a conversation to see the person's Snapcode along with some other options.

Your Trophy Case is visible above your Snapcode from the main profile view. You unlock trophies as you complete certain activities in the app.

When you're watching someone else's Story, swipe up to quickly send them a chat.

You can create your own geofilters for neighborhoods, cities, or more personal events like birthday parties and weddings.

You can play music in the background of video snaps: just start a song, open Snapchat, and start recording.

The best Snapchat tips, tricks, and Easter eggs

There are hidden drawing colors! On the iPhone, you can access white by touching the palette and dragging your finger towards the top-left corner. To get black, touch the palette and drag your finger toward the bottom of the screen. Pink is unlocked as you drag between the two colors.

The same trick works for turning large text black.

Select each word (or letter) of big text to change its color separately.

You can blow up an emoji to create your own colored filter.

No service? No problem: you can shoot snaps without an internet connection and send them later when you have service.

When you're taking a video snap, drag up on the screen with your finger to zoom in with one hand.

Tap and hold on part of a conversation to save it. The next time you open the chat conversation, scroll up to see what you saved.

You can search for stickers in a chat conversation with keywords. Just type a keyword, like "wow" or "dope" and tap the sticker button.

Snapchat doesn't support group messaging, but you can use this clever emoji hack to quickly send a snap to a group of people.

If you have a group of people you often send the same snaps to, like work colleagues or friends from college, you can assign all of their Snapchat names the same emoji to quickly group them together.

The next time you want to send a snap to the group, just type the corresponding emoji into the search box.

Press and hold the Chat button in the app's main navigation bar to quickly search for a friend. Press and hold the right Stories button to start playing the most recent Story in your feed.

The Snapchat camera can recognize any QR code and open its corresponding web link.

There's a way to record a snap without any hands.

Check out our guide to learn more.

Edit someone's name to say whatever you want.

Snapchat doesn't notify you when someone unfollows you, but you can always check by looking for their Snapscore. If it's not visible, they don't follow you.

The best Snapchat tips, tricks, and Easter eggs

You can stack filters on top of each other to create multiple effects at once. Tap and hold on the screen with one filter enabled and then swipe again with another finger to keep adding.

Turn on Travel Mode if you're worried about Snapchat using too much of your phone's data plan. You can find it under "Manage" in your settings.

One of Snapchat's many quirks is the list of emojis it puts next to your friends' names. They're called Friend Emojis. Here's what they mean:

You can read each Friend Emoji's description and create custom ones under "Manage" in your settings.

A Snapstreak between you and a friend is designated by a number that tells you both how many consecutive days you've snapped each other. The Hourglass emoji warns you when your streak with someone is about to end.

The colored icons to the left of your friends' names are indicators of the kinds of messages being sent and whether they've been opened already or not.

These two icons are important to understand when you're chatting with someone:

Tap the icon at the top left of the screen in a conversation to see the person's Snapcode along with some other options.

Your Trophy Case is visible above your Snapcode from the main profile view. You unlock trophies as you complete certain activities in the app.

When you're watching someone else's Story, swipe up to quickly send them a chat.

You can create your own geofilters for neighborhoods, cities, or more personal events like birthday parties and weddings.

You can play music in the background of video snaps: just start a song, open Snapchat, and start recording.

The best Snapchat tips, tricks, and Easter eggs

There are hidden drawing colors! On the iPhone, you can access white by touching the palette and dragging your finger towards the top-left corner. To get black, touch the palette and drag your finger toward the bottom of the screen. Pink is unlocked as you drag between the two colors.

The same trick works for turning large text black.

Select each word (or letter) of big text to change its color separately.

You can blow up an emoji to create your own colored filter.

No service? No problem: you can shoot snaps without an internet connection and send them later when you have service.

When you're taking a video snap, drag up on the screen with your finger to zoom in with one hand.

Tap and hold on part of a conversation to save it. The next time you open the chat conversation, scroll up to see what you saved.

You can search for stickers in a chat conversation with keywords. Just type a keyword, like "wow" or "dope" and tap the sticker button.

Snapchat doesn't support group messaging, but you can use this clever emoji hack to quickly send a snap to a group of people.

Press and hold the Chat button in the app's main navigation bar to quickly search for a friend. Press and hold the right Stories button to start playing the most recent Story in your feed.

The Snapchat camera can recognize any QR code and open its corresponding web link.

There's a way to record a snap without any hands.

Edit someone's name to say whatever you want.

Snapchat doesn't notify you when someone unfollows you, but you can always check by looking for their Snapscore. If it's not visible, they don't follow you.

Popular Right Now