Telegram lets you protect messages, delete by date, manage devices

It’s that most wonderful time of the month when Telegram brings its users a feature drop. Just like every month, the update brings a ton of new things that users of the messaging app will find useful and sometimes even fun. This drop, probably the last for the year, brings tools for groups and channels including the ability to protect messages. There are also some new features for one-on-one chats including deleting messages by date and easily managing devices that use your Telegram account.

Groups and Channels will now be able to protect the content they publish and make them available for members only. When you turn on the restrict saving content setting, members will not be able to forward messages and they will not be able to take screenshots as well. The ability to save media posts will also be limited. It will now be easier to do anonymous posting on public groups as you can send messages in chats and appear as your channel. Admins that receive requests to join their group or channel will see which community they are from if the admin responds with a message.

For one-on-one chats, users will now be able to clear their chat history from a specific day or date range, giving them more control over their digital footprint. If you have a lot of devices and you use Telegram on all of them, there’s a new button in the Devices menu that will make it easier for you to link a desktop device. You will also be able to automatically log out certain devices if they’ve been inactive for a period of time.

Some devices will now be able to receive a login call and instead of a code, you’ll enter several digits from the number that called you. The Chat Settings has been fully redesigned and you’ll see the 8 new themes introduced last September front and center. Each of these themes has a Night and Day theme as well as colorful animated background and gradient message bubbles. There are also some iOS-only features but we’ll talk about that when it becomes available on Android.

Update your Telegram app to the latest version so you can enjoy all these new tools and features. These big feature drops is just one of the reasons why it’s one of the most popular messaging apps right now.