Telegram is making Stories available for all. The feature, which debuted last month, is no longer exclusive to Premium subscribers. The company announced this update on Monday, August 14, to celebrate its 10th anniversary.
Telegram is one of the most popular messaging apps globally. It offers a robust set of features with extensive privacy controls, making it the first choice of many. However, throughout its ten years of existence, the app lacked Stories, those temporary photos and videos that you see on pretty much every messaging and social media platform out there (known as Status on WhatsApp).
That finally changed last month when Telegram added Stories, after originally announcing the feature in June. However, the company kept the feature hidden behind the Premium paywall. Those paying for the $4.99 per month subscription (which also offers additional perks like larger file uploads, faster downloads, transcriptions, and ad-free experience) could only post Stories on the app, though everyone could see them.
After about a month of this exclusivity, Stories on telegram are rolling out to everyone. Once available for you, you should see a “+” button at the top of your chat list. You can tap this button to quickly post a Story on Telegram. Along with photos and videos, the app also lets you add captions and links to your Stories. You can even tag other users. Telegram offers several photo and video-editing tools to stylize Stories.
Like other apps, Telegram lets you use pre-captured photos and videos to create Stories or instantly capture one from within the app. You can even record a video with the front and back cameras simultaneously and post it as a Story. Your Stories will expire after 6, 12, 24, or 48 hours, depending on your setting. If you want to make a Story permanent on your profile, Telegram lets you do that.
Telegram Premium users get exclusive Stories features
While Stories are rolling out to everyone, Telegram is still offering exclusive features to Premium users. Among those are priority orders on other people’s Stories feed, stealth mode (others can’t see that you have viewed their Story), permanent view history, longer captions, and support for up to 100 Stories each day. You can find more details here. Meanwhile, if Stories are not yet available for you, you might want to check for an update for the app. You can click the button below to download the latest version of Telegram from the Google Play Store.