Telegram to soon announce paid subscription plans

Messaging app Telegram will soon announce a paid subscription plan for its users.

Telegram Premium, as it will be known, is launching before the end of the month. Before you start worrying, however, note that all the current free features will remain free. Not just that, but new features are also coming to the free tier in the future.

Telegram Premium will allow "anyone to acquire additional features, speed, and resources," Durov says. It will also "allow users to support Telegram and join the club that receives new features first."

Even users who don't subscribe to Telegram Premium can indirectly enjoy some of its benefits, like viewing extra-large documents, media, and stickers sent by Premium users or tapping to add Premium reactions already pinned to a message to react in the same way.

Durov ends his announcement, which he befittingly posted on Telegram, by revealing that the company's ad experiments in public channels have been more successful than they were expecting. However, even with that being the case, he thinks the service should be primarily funded by its users, not advertisers, to ensure that the users remain its priority.