WhatsApp is the indisputable leader when it comes to messaging, primarily because of its huge user base. Since it has been acquired by Facebook, the social media giant has tried to integrate a lot of features corresponding to its other social media apps such as Instagram and Facebook itself. With this implementation, WhatsApp has soaked up the flavours of a social media platform and is now far from being a simple messaging platform. While a lot of users have come to like the additional features, it might be distracting who want to use the app for simple and meaningful conversation and this is where another great messenger – Telegram – comes into the picture. Telegram is a simple, cross-platform messaging service with a security-first approach and a variety of extra features like programmable bots, allowing users to highly customize how they communicate with others.

Before taking the battle between WhatsApp and Telegram further, let us take a look at the difference between the number of users employing the two apps. A larger user base translates to a more polished overall end-user experience, a smaller number of experimental features, and a better customer support channel.

Features Comparison

WhatsApp and Telegram, both boast of some unique features that differentiate them from one another. So, let’s take a look at their notable features:

  • Group Video Calling

Rolled out in 2016, WhatsApp’s video calling feature has become more and more advanced over time and the messaging platform recently added support for video calling from within WhatsApp groups. Using this feature, you can call a maximum of three other people – adding the tally up to four users including yourself. You can simply initiate a new group video call directly from any WhatsApp group by tapping on the Phone icon on the top bar, and then adding the participants to the call.

Group Video Calling

Status & Stories

While adding text statuses, users get the options to change the font style and the background color of the status. Unlike Instagram, there is no option to add special moments to your highlights yet, but at the F8 conference last year Facebook announced that it will allow users to post their Spotify’s “Now Playing” as their WhatsApp status. As per recent news, WhatsApp could show ads to users in the Status tab to generate revenue from WhatsApp.

WhatsApp Business

Download WhatsApp Business (Free)

WhatsApp Payments

The feature has since been available to WhatsApp beta users in India (as well as non-beta ones who are invited by the existing users), allowing them to transfer money using UPI. Any further development has, however, hit the wall after the Reserve Bank of India necessitated that all the data related to financial transactions must be stored on servers within the country itself and not overseas. Currently, the feature stays limited to a small bunch of users but if you want to try it out, you can use our guide on how to get WhatsApp Payments working.

Format Text

WhatsApp recently introduced the ability to format texts, which is a pretty cool feature. You can now format texts in Bold (text), Italics (text), Bold & Italic (text) and strike through (~text~).

  • Secret Chat

Telegram’s “secret chat” feature lets you have a conversation with end-to-end encryption among other security options. There are notifications for screenshots taken and you can’t forward a message from a secret chat. You can also set a self-destruct timer, which will destruct your messages after a specified time. If you are looking for a secure messaging experience, Secret chat has got you covered.

Secret Chat

Share different file types up to 1.5 GB

There is no match for Telegram’s file sharing abilities as you can send almost any file type including documents, zip, PDF etc. on the messenger besides the usual media files. On Telegram, you can send files up to 1.5 GB, unlike WhatsApp, where you can share files up to a meager 100 MB (limited to 16GB for media).

Create and Download Themes

  • Auto Night Mode

Auto Night Mode

Two-Factor Authentication

  • Instant View

Instant View

Multi-device access

Thanks to its cloud based sync feature, Telegram supports multi-device sessions, so you can start chatting on one device and continue it on another. All the messages too are synced between devices in real time, so it’s quick and efficient. You can even check your active sessions in the app to know the devices in which your Telegram account might be active.

Super groups and public channels

Telegram includes Super groups, which can hold up to 1000 members along with cool public as well as private channels. Channels are essentially broadcasting to a larger audience and it can hold unlimited members. When you send a message through a channel, the message is sent through the channels name. A public channel has its own username and can be searched & joined by any Telegram user. A user can even send mute messages in channels along with the ability to edit sent messages.

  • Telegram Bots

Telegram Bots are basically Telegram accounts created to do certain tasks. Every bot comes with its own set of commands and features. For instance, the @Pollbot can be used to create polls in groups, @Storebot comes in handy if you want to search for more cool bots. There are tons of different & useful bots available on Telegram bot store or you can search for bots directly from the app as well.

Telegram Bots

Lock chats and Ability to hide last seen for particular contact

The ability to hide last seen in Telegram is very similar to WhatsApp’s implementation but there’s a little twist. Telegram lets you hide last seen for particular contacts. So, instead of hiding your last seen for everybody, you can simply hide it from a single contact or more. Also, you can lock your chats on Telegram with the passcode feature, so that no one else reads your personal messages.

Edit Messages

Ever wanted to edit the message you just sent? Well, bid adieu to typos, as Telegram now lets you edit sent messages. You can simply press hold on a message you have sent and hit the “edit” icon to start editing the text. The edited messages will have an edited banner on them.

Payments

While Telegram is not a payments provider in itself, it does support payments on the platform with the help of bots. These bots cannot collect payments directly from your Telegram account but can help you generate invoices, payment reminder, and interfaces using which anyone who’s supposed to pay you can be directed to the desired platform. Payment bots can be used to accept payments via credit cards as well as services such as CLICK, Payme, Paymentwall, and more. However, in order to create a Payment bot, you will have to use Telegram’s Bots API and you will need sufficient coding prowess. So while you can’t really pay your friends and family with Telegram, businesses can add payments to their bots which will make it easier to shop using Telegram bots.

When it comes to features, Telegram wins it by a significant margin, as it brings some unique features that surely make a difference when it comes to usability. While WhatsApp has group video calling and end-to-end encryption for all chats, Telegram is clearly the superior option with its self-destruct timer, multi-device support along with tons of other small yet unique features (internal media player, bots,  Instant View 2.0, etc). However, WhatsApp is slowly adding a number of cool features and it’s already beta testing a bunch of awesome features that could certainly make it better than Telegram. Well, here’s hoping Telegram too ups the ante.

The security of chats on WhatsApp has been constantly under question despite the platform first introducing text message encryption in 2014, and later revamping it to complete end-to-end encryption in 2016. Last year, WhatsApp’s co-founder Jan Koum quit apparently due to a disagreement with Facebook’s board over privacy and encryption and since then, there have been concerns about the company sacrificing encryption and reading users’ private messages to show them ads within the messenger.

Furthermore, special features like Secret Chats and Self-destruct timers make your chats more secure and even more difficult to be intercepted by anti-privacy advocates. This shows that, unlike WhatsApp, Telegram is not willing to compromise the privacy and security of users to reap financial gains, making us lean in its favour when it comes to security. Moreover, since WhatsApp chats for Android users are stored on Google Drive, these chats are not encrypted, which means an attack on your Google account (or Google Drive in general) can result in loss of data.

There’s no clear winner here, as WhatsApp and Telegram both perform admirably well although Telegram can be sometimes quicker in sending a message due to its cloud sync feature. When it comes to usage, both WhatsApp and Telegram are very easy to use, with similar working apps. However, Telegram’s gesture-based UI makes things quicker and fun.

Platform Compatibility

WhatsApp is available on mobile devices, web and it also offers desktop clients for Mac and Windows. Comparatively, Telegram has desktop clients for Windows, macOS, and even Linux. Moreover, Telegram also has a web app available on the Chrome Web Store and due to its open-source nature, there are third party Telegram apps available as well –  although we recommend you to beware while using a Telegram client by an unknown or unidentified developer.

WhatsApp

Pros:

Cons:

  • Limited file sharing
  • Not as feature-rich as Telegram
  • Chats on Google Drive not encrypted
  • Owned by Facebook

Telegram

Cons:

Telegram is more feature-rich and secure but WhatsApp has more users

WhatsApp is now catching up with Telegram in most of the categories and Telegram’s relatively smaller user base isn’t too compelling. While we do hope that Telegram’s user base grows rapidly, it is not likely to overtake WhatsApp anytime soon. WhatsApp has been testing and adding new features quickly these days, and new ones keep popping up. For instance, WhatsApp is now testing Status preview on iOS for video statuses, much like the long-press-to-preview option on Instagram.