Telegram, our chatting app of choice since we don’t want to deal with the colors of bubbles and like to message people with ease and a robust set of features on all platforms, is getting a big update to end the week. There are stories for channels now (with a weird boost system to cap their activity level), reaction stickers in stories, music in stories, and more, like new prompts for logins.
Telegram tends to dive into lengthy details on all of this stuff, so we’ll leave those to you in that link at the bottom to really look through. Otherwise, here is the abbreviated version of all that Telegram announced today:
- Channel stories: We got stories for Telegram in August as a way to share an ongoing feed of your life like you do on Instagram. Those same stories are rolling out to channels to use, but understand that your favorite channels can’t just spam you with all of the stories. Telegram built in a system called “boosts” that let you boost a channel with a vote that levels up a channel. As that channel levels up, they can then post more stories. It’s an odd idea that I fear will one day turn into a pay-to-win scheme, but for now, you are in control in a way.
- Reaction stickers in stories: Users and channels can add reaction stickers to stories, letting users tap them to react, which then leads to reaction counters. That’s fun.
- Music in stories: If you have audio files saved on your device, you can use those in photo and video stories. So yeah, make your own beats and have that custom story vibe at all times.
- View once media: Telegram has always let you send disappearing media and now that “View Once” idea is easier to use, has a new look, and can be found as a new setting.
- New login alerts: When someone (or you) logs into Telegram from another device, a new notification will show up at the top of your chat list. You can then say “Yes it’s me” or “No it’s not me!” to move forward.
Go grab that update!
Google Play Link: Telegram
// Telegram