With Android 11, Google introduced a basically picture-perfect copy of Messenger’s chat heads as a system-wide feature, simply called bubbles. When messaging apps support it, they can display their interface on top of what you’re doing on your screen, staying instantly accessible in the form of a floating bubble as soon as someone writes you. Following Facebook Messenger and Google Messages, Telegram has now joined the club and supports the new optional Android 11 notification display method.
After the update to Telegram version 7 (which has also introduced a video calling alpha), the app automatically starts popping up in bubbles for many people using the current Android 11 beta. Some even see a short introduction to the feature, with the OS telling them that “new conversations appear as floating icons, or bubbles. Tap to open bubble. Drag to move it.”
Unfortunately, bubbles are still unstable for some, and a few of our tipsters have reported that all of their keyboard apps force close when they try to write a message in the new interface. Some group chats and bots also won’t have their proper profile images attached to them, showing only the generic Telegram icon in the bubble. Let’s hope that Google and Telegram will fix these quirks before Android 11 goes stable.
If you don’t like the bubbles at all, you can deactivate them by holding the Telegram icon in your launcher, tapping the i symbol to go to app info, choosing Notifications, and then Bubbles. In there, you can select your preference (see screenshot on the right above).
You can download Telegram version 7 from the Play Store, but we also got it on APK Mirror if you prefer. Keep in mind that you need to be on Android 11 to use the bubbles.
- Thanks:
- Armando,
- @EngineerGunter
