After celebrating 10 years last month, Telegram announced a bunch of new features and improvements for both regular and Premium users. Among the most important changes included in this update are the ability for channels to post stories and new reaction stickers that are now available in Stories.
Starting today, Telegram users can grant channels the ability to post stories by giving them boosts. However, only Telegram Premium users are getting one boost that can be assigned to any channel.
Each channel can level up once they gain more boosts and, more importantly, for each level Telegram users can post one additional story per day. It’s a rather complicated system meant to encourage people to pay for Premium if they want to boost their Stories.
Telegram also announced that channels can ask subscribers for boosts using a special link. The link can be generated by heading to Channel Info / More / Statistics / Boosts. Once a channel reaches level 10, it will get +15 resistance to trolls and unlock unique admin skins, whatever that might mean.
Additionally, once a channel unlocks Stories, admins with a Telegram Premium subscription can post by tapping the plus icon on the Channel Info page. Furthermore, the latest update introduces the ability to add reaction stickers to Stories. Each story posted by channels will now show reaction counters to allow users to see how many people chose each emotion. A new icon in the sticker panel is now available for those who wish to add a reaction sticker. Premium subscribers can use any of their custom emoji in addition to the regular stickers.
With the latest version of Telegram, users can use audio files from their devices in photo and video stories. Make sure to tap “Audio” from the sticker panel and select a file to be able to adjust the track if you want to select a specific part.
Finally, Telegram is getting new login alerts. The latest version of the app will send notifications to all your devices. The new logins will also display an alert at the top of the chat list.