Telegram Launches in-app Browser and Mini App Store Making Web3 Available to Almost a Billion Users

Messaging app Telegram has announced a new in-app browser that supports multiple tabs, making Web3 available to almost a billion users, a Mini App Store, a new kind of mini apps, the ability to gift Stars to friends — and much more.

Telegram Browser

Pages you open with the in-app browser can now be collapsed and reopened from the bottom bar, allowing you to freely move between your messages and websites, instant view articles, and mini apps.

Telegram's browser supports decentralized websites hosted on TON — in all mobile and native desktop apps. This makes Web3 immediately available to our almost one billion monthly users.

Now, when you receive a notification while reading an article, viewing a web page, or playing a game, you can check your messages — and go back without losing your progress. You can also add bookmarks to return to a page later.

Developers can learn more about decentralized TON Sites by visiting ton.org — or opening getting-started.ton in the latest version of Telegram.

Mini App Store

More than 500 million out of Telegram's 950 million users interact with mini apps every month.

We've added a new 'Apps' tab in Search which shows a list of apps you use and a list of popular mini apps. Now you can quickly access all your games and services — or find something new.

Developers can now upload video demos and screenshots for their mini app previews to let users know what to expect.

Mini apps that utilize Telegram Stars now have a chance to be shown in the 'Popular Apps' section. Developers can learn more about mini apps on this page.

Sharing from Mini Apps to Stories

Mini apps can now generate custom story content — like AI-generated videos, achievements, or snapshots of leaderboards — for users to share as a Telegram Story right from the mini app. This enables new kinds of apps — and helps existing ones spread among their users' contacts.

Developers can go here for more details about adding this feature to their mini apps.

Gifting Stars to Friends

Telegram Stars let you buy digtal goods in mini apps or access paid content in channels. With this update, you can buy stars as a gift for your contacts.

To gift stars, go to Settings > My Stars (on iOS, you will currently see this menu only if you have previously purchased stars for yourself).

Users celebrating their birthday will appear at the top of the list in a special section. Gifted stars will show up in the chat as a beautiful animated gift box.
Flash when Recording Video Messages

Video messages now let you use the front flash to brighten your screen with extra light when recording in the dark.

Tap the microphone icon in the message bar to switch to video recording. Then press and hold the camera icon to record your video message. Swipe up to keep recording and tap the flash icon in the bottom left corner.
Weather Widget in Stories

Users can now share the weather in their stories by adding an animated widget to everything from sunny selfies to ski slopes.
Story Covers

When posting a video story to your profile, you can choose which frame will be used as the cover photo.

Browser and Mini App Tabs on MacOS

Before you go, check out how gorgeous the new browser on Telegram for macOS is. Its new tabs support everything: games, mini apps, instant view pages and even Web3 ton-sites.

Telegram to Launch Its Own Mini App Store and In-App Browser

Telegram, the popular messaging app, is making some exciting moves. Founder Pavel Durov recently announced that Telegram will launch an in-app browser and a mini app store by the end of July 2024.

Recently, Telegram announced that its active user base has surged to 950 million, and they aim to cross the 1 billion mark this year. The growth in users comes amid an explosion in blockchain-based games, such as NotCoin, that users tap to play on Telegram.

The upcoming app store within Telegram will allow users to discover and access mini apps directly from the platform. The mini app store will host lightweight applications within Telegram. These mini apps can offer various functionalities, including games, tools, and services.

The app store will also have web3 support, aligning with Telegram's commitment to blockchain and cryptocurrency. This move comes after the company's initial coin offering (ICO) in 2018 faced challenges. Now, Telegram is actively promoting web3 technology on its platform.

The in-app browser will allow users to view web content directly within Telegram, streamlining their experience. No need to switch between apps.

According to Pavel Durov, CEO and Founder of Telegram, "To keep the fire going, this month, we will introduce a mini app store and an in-app browser with support for Web3-Pages. "

Telegram acknowledges the issue of scams and is taking steps to address it. The messaging app plans to display the month of registration and principal country for public accounts, similar to Instagram. Additionally, organizations can use mini apps to issue labels for channels, creating a decentralized marketplace for third-party verification.

Back in 2022, Durov had said that Telegram aims to develop decentralized tools, including non-custodial wallets and decentralized exchanges, to securely facilitate cryptocurrency transactions for millions,

Telegram is continuously evolving. In early of this month Telegram launched series of new features and updates, including "Minimized Mini Apps" feature wherein users can minimize mini apps for smoother multitasking. This feature enhances the overall user experience by allowing seamless transitions between different tasks within the app. "Telegram Stars" enables users to purchase digital goods and reward creators through paid posts. It's a way to support content creators and engage with their work.

Hashtag and Location Search in Stories also launched recently. Content discovery gets a boost with hashtag and location search functionality in Telegram Stories. Users can explore relevant content more easily. A new "customizable link widget" improves link visibility within stories. This feature allows creators to share links effectively with their audience.

HUAWEI's App Gallery is the Third Largest App Store in the World: Build on Secure and Reliable Mobile Apps Ecosystem

Huawei's vision is to make HUAWEI AppGallery an open, innovative app distribution platform that is accessible to consumers.

Huawei aims to strictly protect users' privacy and security while providing them with a unique and smart experience.

The gradual proliferation of 5G means a revolutionised mobile experience. Increasingly, consumers are using multiple devices in various scenarios and mobile apps are key to that ever richer, hyperconnected experience. As such, Huawei believes that demand for smarter apps will only increase and they want to be at the forefront to enable this massive change.

Enter HUAWEI AppGallery - the official app distribution platform of Huawei, providing a new alternative to its users. As a top 3 app marketplace globally, HUAWEI AppGallery is now available in over 170 countries/regions with 400 million monthly active users (MAUs), covering mainstream apps and services worldwide.

HUAWEI AppGallery

Vision of a Top 3 App Marketplace Globally

"'Privacy, under your control' has always been at the heart of our philosophy," Richard Yu, CEO of Huawei Consumer Business Group commented, "We place privacy protection and cyber security as the top priorities of all our business operations and strictly implement them in all phases of our products. We also have the strictest privacy and cyber security solutions in HUAWEI AppGallery."

Huawei has hundreds of millions of users worldwide, laying a solid foundation for the development of the ecosystem. Together with HMS Core, which opens a variety of Huawei software and hardware capabilities, Huawei is enroute to providing the best and innovative application experience for users.

For a brand that rose sharply to rank 10th place Brand Finances 2020 annual global brand value ranking, nothing seems impossible. In fact, Huawei has invested in more than 3,000 engineers on ecosystem engineering. The brand also provides one-stop operational support for developers worldwide, as well as funding such as the "Shining-Star" program to incentivise innovation.

HUAWEI AppGallery is a trusted platform where users can download apps

HUAWEI AppGallery comes with full-cycle security and protection, including developer real-name verification and four-step review process for secure app operation. All apps go through a stringent verification test to prevent developers' apps from malicious activity. It has an age-rating system to create a safe environment for children, filtering out apps that are not suitable for their age range.

AppGallery deploys the highest level of verification to isolate and protect users' sensitive data and privacy. Personally-sensitive information - such as biometric data - will never be processed outside the Huawei device, giving the user complete control over their personal data. EMUI lets users have control over app user permission. More importantly, all user data is also anonymised and stored locally, corresponding to each user's region.

HUAWEI AppGallery is the destination for quality apps for Huawei device users.

Huawei is continuously working on increasing the selection of top apps that have become a staple of its users' digital lifestyle, including both popular global applications and quality localised applications our users have come to love and depend on. HUAWEI AppGallery segments applications across 18 categories, including news, social media, entertainment and more, all searchable with a simple and smooth browsing experience. If there's an app users can't find, all they have to do is submit the desired app name to a 'Wishlist'. Once this app goes on-shelf, the user who submitted it via 'Wishlist' will be notified.

Huawei is also committed to creating the best user experience by providing quality apps. In its latest content partnership, Huawei has collaborated with News UK, one of the UK's biggest media companies, to bring the most accurate and updated news to Huawei users. Huawei users will get to enjoy access to daily articles, radio shows and exclusive content on their Huawei devices, bringing greater convenience to users' smart lifestyles.

"I think this is a really good long-term partnership we can have with Huawei. I feel there's a lot more innovation we can do and really drive forward amazing customer experiences on that devices," said Christina Scott, Chief Technology Officer of News UK.

HUAWEI AppGallery offers apps optimised to work on Huawei devices, for an innovative and smart experience

Apps downloaded from HUAWEI AppGallery are optimized to work on Huawei devices, providing incredible on-device capability. The key enabler is HUAWEI HiAI, an open AI capability platform for smart devices, which pools software and hardware resources from different devices and facilitates collaborative, mutually-reinforcing interactions between them.

For example, the WPS Office app uses the HiAI intelligent recognition capability to achieve super-resolution optical character recognition to recognise text in images such as scanned documents and photos. The in-app documents are automatically detected and corrected, greatly improving productivity.

HUAWEI AppGallery introduces a tap-to-use and installation-free experience with 'Quick Apps'

Quick Apps is an app ecosystem that houses a new type of installation-free apps. It provides a good user experience, powerful functions and automatic updates for HTML5 pages, but consumes very little memory space. Despite giving users the same experience as native apps, Quick Apps are written with only 1/5 amount of codes as compared to that of Android apps, therefore taking up less memory space. Users can accommodate more than 2,000 Quick Apps instead of just 20 native apps with just 1GB of space.

Users can even add their favourite Quick Apps to their desktops for convenient access. Quick Apps are used on over 350 million Huawei phones. To date, there are more than 1,700 Quick Apps released globally, a 200% growth year-on-year.

To keep up the pace with 5G, Quick App will be gradually rolled out to more countries and regions, opening China market's mature Quick App standards and IDE development tools to global developers. All developers across the world are welcomed to publish Quick App to jointly deliver tap-to-use and installation-free experience to users.

Huawei will continue its efforts in building the HMS Ecosystem and HUAWEI AppGallery to bring to life all-scenario smart life experience to Huawei users. Do stay tuned for more updates.

For more information on HUAWEI AppGallery, please visit consumer.huawei.com/en/mobileservices/appgallery.

About Huawei Consumer BG

Huawei's products and services are available in more than 170 countries and are used by a third of the world's population. Fifteen R&D centers have been set up in the United States, Germany, Sweden, Russia, India and China. Huawei Consumer BG is one of Huawei's three business units and covers smartphones, PC and tablets, wearables and cloud services, etc. Huawei's global network is built on almost 30 years of expertise in the telecom industry and is dedicated to delivering the latest technological advances to consumers around the world.

For more information please visit: consumer.huawei.com.

~ Newsvoir