Chat app Telegram has been around for 7 years and is celebrating it with a long-awaited feature: in this tip, we show how Telegram video calling works.
Telegram video calling now available for iOS
In a blog post Telegram celebrates its 7th anniversary. Four hundred million people are now said to be using the app. As a treat, an app update has been released that now allows you to video call with Telegram in addition to audio calls. You activate this as follows.
This is how you start a video call in Telegram:
- Make sure you have the most recent version of Telegram on your iPhone or iPad;
- Tap the chat of the person you are going to video call with;
- Tap his or her name;
- Tap ‘Video’ below the profile picture.
Telegram says it will roll out the feature gradually. It is therefore possible that the Video button is not yet available for you. In that case, there is no other option than to wait. In addition, the chat app emphasizes that it is an ‘alpha version’, which will be further expanded with more functions in future versions.
For an alpha version, however, the video calling feature is surprisingly complete: you can turn video on and off at the touch of a button and switch to an au
dio call and picture-in-picture mode allows you to get back to your treasure call or message someone else while calling. The biggest feature that is missing is group conversations, which will be added later.
Also new animated emoji
Telegram’s video calls are secured with end-to-end encryption. You can check this yourself: if the four emoji in the top corner of your screen are the same as those of your recipient, then you can assume, according to Telegram, that you are on a one hundred percent secure connection.
In addition to adding video calling, Telegram is also introducing a number of new animated emoji with the update. You only have to send an emoji as you always do, after which Telegram makes a larger, moving version of it.