Telegam talked about two new official apps: the X versions for iOS and Android. Both were created from scratch in order to develop even more actively through internal competition. They will also be “experimenting”: most likely everything “new” and, possibly, controversial, will first appear in the X-versions.
Translation of the birth story of Telegram X from the official Telegram blog.
Telegram X: competition is the engine of progress
Our mission is to make Telegram faster, more reliable and easier to use every month. Competition is the engine of progress, so at first we were inspired a lot by other messengers, their success spurred us on. But time passed, and we noticed that competitors were introducing less and less innovations, and now they only care about new Telegram features appearing in their applications (on average, two years after they appeared with us).
In such a situation, we began to rely on internal competition , which is now throwing wood on the fire for us. For this reason, for the last two years, we have been busy developing a new generation of Telegram clients in parallel with the main versions of the messenger.
The Telegram X project features applications written from scratch, based on completely new code and without the outdated components that our old applications have accumulated over the years.
Telegram X
The goal of Telegram X is to reinvent Telegram and push the boundaries in terms of speed, ease of use, animation quality and all other aspects. Today we are pleased to present to you two of our new official applications – Telegram X for Android and iOS.
These apps are experimental and may or may not replace our classic official apps. But even if this does not happen, they will accelerate the development of Telegram, allowing us to quickly test new approaches and technologies.
X for Android
Telegram X for Android was born in the oven of an Android developer contest that our founder launched two years ago. The winner took full advantage of the TDLib (Telegram Database Library) library to create an amazing application with a special focus on smooth animation .
Our X app for Android is faster and saves smartphone battery better than the classic client, and boasts a new design full of gloss and shine.
Telegram X also supports bubble-free chat mode , in which messages and photos have more free space – and photos posted to channels are displayed in full screen width:
In Telegram X, you can tap on any chat and hold your finger to view the chat content without having to open it. This method works throughout the application, even in the Send and Forward Messages menu, and in the ‘Calls’ and ‘Groups in Common’ tabs.
This application also offers many actions that can be performed with swipes . For example, you can switch between the ‘Chats’ and ‘Calls’ sections by swiping left or right on the main screen. You can swipe right on any message to quickly open a menu for sharing it:
The app also has a reimagined music player and attachment menu , as well as optimized profile pages , with quick access to shared media files . You can easily switch between different types of media files with swipes.
This entire list of options, of course, is far from exhaustive. A small surprise awaits you in every corner of Telegram X for Android.
The app is now ready to start an experimental journey, with new options coming next week.
Telegram X for iOS
Telegram X for iOS is written entirely in Swift and is significantly lighter, faster and more power-intensive than the original Objective C app.
The design and feature set is close to what iOS users expect from Telegram, but you will definitely notice smoother animations , faster browsing and loading speeds on most iPhones.
The internal structure of Telegram X for iOS is also optimized for the innovations that are expected in Telegram in 2018 and beyond. As with the Android version of X, today’s launch of Telegram X for iOS marks the start of a long journey.
Wait for our new updates – both for experimental versions and for classic applications.
January 31, 2018,
Telegram team
Translation prepared by the TeleGuide team