Facebook Marketplace location filter not working? Here's what's actually happening

You set the radius to 10 miles. The first row of results is 40 miles away. You set it again — same thing. You are not imagining it, and you are not doing it wrong.

The radius is a suggestion, not a rule

Marketplace's distance control appears to influence ranking more than it limits results. In practice, the feed behaves as if it's assembled from what's popular and available in a broad region around the location it inferred for you, with the radius nudging that mix rather than fencing it. Two consequences follow:

• Faraway listings leak in. Especially for popular categories, results well outside your radius routinely rank into the feed.
• The location it uses may not be yours. Marketplace can key off the rough location of your network connection, not your actual neighborhood — on a VPN or a corporate network it can be a different city entirely.

What actually helps

1. Set the place explicitly, not just the radius. Searching against a named place gives more consistent local results than adjusting distance alone.
2. Check each listing's stated city before you commit. The distance shown on the feed can be missing or stale; the listing's own city is the reliable field.
3. Sort by distance when the option appears. It surfaces the close-by listings the default ranking buries.
4. Re-set the location after travel. If you searched from another city recently, the inferred location can stick.

The shortcut

Openmarket, a free iOS app for browsing local listings, was built around exactly this frustration. You set a place and a radius together, results respect them, and every card shows its city and its real distance from you — plus walking, driving, and transit time on the listing itself. If a result is outside your radius, it simply doesn't appear.