In brief: Telegram has announced a Premium subscription for its 700 million monthly active users. Although no official pricing was revealed, regions where the tier is now live suggests the price is between $5-$6/pm, giving subscribers access to nearly a dozen exclusive features. The tier arrives as part of an app update, which also brings lots of fixes and optimizations.
It was inevitable for a service as big as Telegram to launch a subscription tier. While announcing the 700 million monthly active users milestone, the messaging company revealed Telegram Premium and all of the features it will unlock for subscribers.
First up is the larger 4GB file upload size, which doubles the limit available to standard users. There will be no restriction/throttling on download speeds, with file downloads now dependent on a user’s bandwidth. Telegram’s premium tier also increases limits for several features inside the app, including bigger chat folders, ability to follow more channels, more pinned chats, and support for up to 4 user accounts.
Moreover, Premium subscribers can convert voice messages to text, set animated profile pictures, change the default chat folder, and get access to unique reactions, stickers and premium app icons. They’ll also get a sponsor-free, no ads experience in the app, alongside a premium badge appearing next to their name.
As for general improvements included in Telegram’s app update, standard and premium users can look forward to better admin controls for Public Groups, with admins now able to set join requests and approve new members, a feature already available for Private Groups. For authenticity, a verification badge will now appear next to public figures and organizations.
In terms of platform-specific enhancements, Telegram’s Android users are getting iOS-like Chat Previews, alongside better quality in audio and video messages, improved controls for saving media to gallery, and alternative app icons.
iOS users, meanwhile, will see an animated progress bar when sending large files externally, as well as smoother 120fps animations. Telegram’s latest update, that’s now rolling out gradually, also brings over 100 fixes and optimizations to the app.
