Introducing Telegram 5.0 for iOS

For the last couple of years we've been quietly rebuilding Telegram for iOS from scratch with Swift – a programming language released by Apple as a faster alternative to Objective C.

Today Telegram 5.0 goes live for all our iOS users, becoming the most popular messaging app written fully in Swift. This new version of Telegram looks just like the old one, but is slicker, more battery-friendly and faster (which is surprising, given how fast the old one already was).

The new app is superior in many ways. We love the new smooth animations in chats. Messages will now sync quickly, even if you haven‘t opened Telegram for a long time and there’s a LOT to sync. We‘ve also improved the app’s activity in the background to ensure that all of your unmuted chats are always up to date.

Step aside — and back

The new expandable in-app notifications will help you focus on whatever you‘re doing in the app without having to ignore incoming messages. When a notification arrives, pull it down to open the relevant chat. When you’re done with the interruption, simply close it to get right back to what you were doing.

Expanded Notification

This works everywhere in the app, including when you are viewing media or reading Instant View articles.

Make every chat count

Previously, badge counters could become less useful after you've joined a group or two with 100,000 members. Today we're making private chats great again.

You can now switch the unread counter to display the number of unmuted chats with unread messages. So instead of 1001 for a thousand messages in a muted group and one very important message from your dog, your badge counter will look like this:

One Unread Chat

You can adjust this behavior in Settings > Notifications and Sounds.

When was that again?

We've improved navigation in busy chats (and elsewhere). Scroll up a little to see the date when the messages you are viewing were sent. Tap this date to go to the first message of the day in question.

The bugs are dead. Long live the bugs!

As much as we would‘ve liked to, we couldn’t port over any of the bugs from the Objective C version. All the old bugs are now gone forever — or, should we say, fixed. We might‘ve added some brand new bugs while coding the new version. But don’t worry, we'll fix those in no time. The same goes for any small features that may be missing.

Meanwhile on macOS…

You can now use swipe gestures to navigate the interfaces on Telegram for macOS. Most notably, you can swipe to reply and the chats list now works the same way it does on iOS: swipe right to Mark as Read/Unread, and left to Pin, Mute or Delete.

Swipe Left or Right for Options

Fancy MacBook Pro owners just got advanced Touch Bar support to help them send stickers and media, control buttons in alerts and pop-up windows and more.

Stickers and more on MacBook Pro

Other new features include auto-night mode settings and a photo editor to rotate and crop pictures before sending. You can also drag and drop photos, media, and documents to change the order in which they will be sent.

…And Telegram Desktop

As for our universal Telegram Desktop app, it just got a massive overhaul in the Settings department. The new layout is similar to what you're used to in our mobile apps:

Telegram Desktop Settings

The latest Telegram Desktop also features improved caching for images and GIFs, as well as new local storage settings. Go to Settings > Advanced > Local Storage to control how much disk space Telegram uses on your machine.

We've also redesigned the theme selector to make it easier to choose a day and night theme that suits you best. Remember, you can make your own themes – or check out some themes created by other users.