Telegram Release Notes

Enjoying the summer is overrated. Try our new update instead:

• Rich Text Editor: Write blogs, articles and long posts.

  • Add tables, inline media, lists, headings, quotes and more.
  • Use an intuitive visual editor optimized for mobile and desktop.
  • Generate text, formulas or tables with our privacy-conscious AI tools.
  • Send over 32,000 characters in a single message.

• Communities: Link several channels, groups, or bots together.

  • Join other chats in a community without an invite link.
  • Access all community chats from a single item in your chat list.
  • Control who can add more chats to your community.

• Ephemeral Messages in Groups: Get replies from bots that are only visible to you.

  • Send ephemeral commands to bots and receive private replies in the same chat.
  • Forget scrolling through AI summaries and greetings meant for other members.

• 350 million GIFs: New, faster search in the GIF panel.

  • Find high-quality GIFs optimized for Telegram (YMMV).
  • Make searches with complete privacy.
  • Enjoy the summer after all.

Rich Text Editor

We know you can barely express yourself in words. So today, we're giving you an advanced text editor with support for headings, tables, lists, quotes and code blocks! It also lets you add photos and videos in the middle of a message.

Don't worry, the editor comes with an intuitive, visual interface — and you can even use our Cocoon-powered AI tools to generate “your” text with full privacy.

Like our rich formatting update for bots, the editor lets you send up to 32,768 characters in a single message. Show those machines what a human can do!

The Rich Text Editor is currently available to Telegram Premium users only. Why? Because otherwise, we'd have to call it the Poor Text Editor — and you don't want that.

Telegram Communities

Several groups, channels, and bots can now be linked together into communities around a shared topic. Community members can see its other chats and join them instantly. Starting a cult has never been easier!

Chats in a community can be Visible to all members or Hidden from everyone except community admins and members of that chat. Cult 101: Always keep a hidden recipe-sharing group for your High Priests.

Communities save space in your chat list. You can toggle whether a community appears as separate chats or as one chat that expands when you open it.

Communities are collaborative by default, allowing any member to add more chats — but you can restrict this in settings before your cultists add 47 cat groups. When adding chats is limited, you will see them as suggestions instead.

Ephemeral Bot Messages

With guest bot mode, you could already get information from bots in any chat. After today’s update, these messages will no longer clutter the group chat for everyone else.

Bots in groups can now send messages visible only to a specific person, such as greeting messages, private AI summaries, errors, confirmations, or menus with buttons.

Bots can send ephemeral messages at any time or in response to specific commands. These commands are highlighted in the bot menu with a special icon, and the resulting messages are visible only to the bot and the person who used them.

Bot developers can learn more about ephemeral messages here.

350 Million GIFs

Did we just say we were not giving you more GIFs? We lied. The GIF panel now lets you search over 350 million GIFs in 36 languages. The new search is powered by offline indexing of widely shared, publicly available GIFs with open-source AI models.

Unlike in all other messaging apps, your Telegram GIF searches are entirely private, don't rely on any third parties — and are now much faster.

That's it. Now go get an ice cream or something.

July 14, 2026
The Telegram Team

Add rich message editor with media, tables and math formulas.

Show rich message drafts with full formatting in chat compose area.

Add text recognition with selection and copying to media viewer images.

Add swipe navigation and pinch zoom gestures to media viewer.

Support zoom and dragging files out in shared media photos.

Allow adapting existing stickers into custom emoji.

Add media viewer video playback to system media controls.

Add alphabetical fast-scroll index to contacts box.

Improve screen reader accessibility for chats list and folders.

Today's update lets you wear Telegram on both wrists and brings dozens of new features and improvements.

• Get Telegram on your Apple Watch or Android smartwatch to:
  • Send text and voice messages
  • Listen to voice messages
  • View media and video messages
  • Read long messages
  • Preview locations
  • Send stickers
  • Manage your chats
• Receive formatted messages from bots with dozens of rich text options:
  • Inline media, carousels, and collages
  • Tables and nested blockquotes
  • Headings and anchors
  • Collapsible sections and footnotes
  • Math formatting and formulas
  • Superscript, subscript, and mooooo0000000re
• Add AI guardians to screen people before they join your groups.
• Include links in poll options.
• Open .md files directly in the Telegram Browser.
• Control which links open in your preferred browser.
• See more of your chats with new header bars on Android.

Watch Apps for Everyone!

Most people have at least one arm, and some of them have a smartwatch. If all of the above is true for you — rejoice: we have new apps for Apple Watch and Android Wear OS.

Now you can browse chats and media, and read messages of any length without risking to drop your phone. Feel free to listen to voice messages and watch videos if there's nobody in the next stall. You can also send text messages — or voice messages, if your hands are busy zipping up.

For some reason, our Android developer added muting and pinning chats, as well as deleting messages. Meanwhile, the iOS developer added viewing locations and sending stickers. Why?? We will never know. We've convinced them to steal these features from each other in the next update.

If you're using a Huawei watch and can't run the Wear OS app, ask nicely — our developers will make an app for you too. If you're using something truly exotic, watch this or make your own app.

Obscenely Rich Text Formatting for Bots

Telegram is where AI bots go to meet, chat, and compete. If you manage to get a bot's attention, it can now respond with rich text — so rich you'll want to start a riot and demand to tax it.

This includes formatting, tables, blockquotes, checklists, inline images, the weird sh#t you need to spell Elon's son's name, and oh so much more.

Bots can also pack a LOT of this stuff into one message — up to 32,768 characters now, with a merciful Show More button after the first 8,000 or so.

Developers are welcome to study our rich text formatting docs here.

Guardian Bots for Group Chats

If you need some smart muscle to guard the door to your group chat, you can add AI bots as admins to process join requests. Naturally, they can also smite the unrighteous who post in the chat, if you want them to.

AI Guardians can use flexible mini-app interfaces to screen new applicants — like finally making people pass an IQ test before posting comments.

Links in Poll Options

You can already do so many things with polls that Telegram could work as a standalone polling app. But is that enough? Never!

Poll options can now include links — for more context and a healthy dose of this.

Support for MD Files

The in-app browser now supports Markdown files in .md format and natively renders the text.

We simply couldn’t rest until a billion-plus Telegram users, mothers and fathers, grandmas and grandpas, and other demographics could open their .md files and view the Markdown properly.

Quick Browser Selection

Links to external sites can be opened right in the Telegram Browser or in your preferred app. Now you can easily choose a different browser from your default when you long press a link — no more copy-pasting links or switching apps.

Seriously, are you still reading this? Did your AI assistant fail to make a summary? Well then, there's more!

On both Android and iOS, you can whitelist sites to always open or never open in the Telegram Browser. By the way, the Telegram Browser does not store browsing history — so your “course research” and “homework assignments” are totally safe.

To manage your browser settings, go to Settings > Chat Settings > In-App Browser on Android or Settings > Privacy and Security > Open Links in on iOS.

This is where we usually add some kind of tie-in to the main topics and tell you that we have more features underway.

ok bye

June 11, 2026
The Telegram Team

Animated 3D objects on settings covers (premium star, coin, diamond).

Particle effects for one-time voice message playback.

Birthday celebration effect on profile.

Poll votes graph in message statistics.

Separate send action animation for round video messages.

Open public channels from chat folder invite links.

Notify toggle and muted icon for silent scheduled messages.

Per-window Qt RHI renderer activation.

Fix empty chat list preview after deleting last message.

Fix shaking of pinned chats dragged past rows of other heights.

Fix scroll with keyboard in chat history.

Fix pause of animated reactions when opening their context menu.

Improve performance with RHI enabled.