Telegram crossed 1 billion monthly active users in March 2025, has around 500 million daily users, and had 15 million paying Premium subscribers as of May 2025. India is its largest market by downloads, its biggest channels reach tens of millions of subscribers, and it is one of the few messaging apps that publishes its user milestones itself. This page collects the numbers with their sources and answers the questions people ask most about how Telegram works, is it safe, and can it be traced.
Telegram by the numbers
| Metric | Figure | Source and date |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly active users | 1 billion | Pavel Durov's announcement, March 2025 |
| Daily active users | About 500 million | Durov, October 2025, reported by TechCrunch |
| Premium subscribers | 15 million | Durov, May 2025 |
| Premium share of monthly users | About 1.5% | Derived from the two figures above |
| Revenue, first half of 2025 | $870 million | Financial Times |
| Largest market | India, about 104 million downloads | DemandSage, 2025 |
| Public channels and groups indexed | Over 2.4 million | SQ Magazine, 2026 |
| Largest single channel | Hamster Kombat, about 26 million subscribers in May 2026, down from a 60 million peak in 2024 | Channel page and BeInCrypto |
| Official Telegram Tips channel | About 10.9 million subscribers | Channel page, 2026 |
| Time in app | Roughly 41 minutes a day, 21 opens a day | Backlinko compilation, 2026 |
Third-party estimates of Telegram's India user base range from about 84 million to 120 million depending on the method; the download figure above is the one most sources agree on. Treat any single India number as an estimate.
Is Telegram growing or declining?
Growing. Telegram reported 950 million monthly users in July 2024 and 1 billion in March 2025, which works out to roughly 2.5 million new users a day over that period according to its own figures. Daily users reached about half of monthly users by late 2025, a retention ratio few platforms of that size reach. Downloads were about 471 million in 2024, up 18% on 2023, per Statista. Growth spikes track privacy controversies at competitors: the largest jumps came after WhatsApp's 2021 policy change.
How many Telegram users are there by region?
Asia is the largest region at roughly 38% of users, then Europe at 27%, Latin America at 21% and the Middle East and North Africa at 8%, per Backlinko's 2026 compilation. Telegram dominates messaging in Russia, Iran, Uzbekistan and much of the former Soviet region, and it is the default group-chat app for crypto, trading and study communities worldwide, which is why India, Indonesia and Brazil show up in every top-five list.
How does Telegram work?
Telegram is a cloud messenger: regular chats, groups and channels are stored on Telegram's servers and sync across every device you log into, which is why you can open years of history on a new phone with no backup. Groups hold up to 200,000 members. Channels are one-to-many broadcasts with unlimited subscribers. Bots are accounts run by software that can post, reply and serve files inside chats. Telegram Premium adds larger uploads, faster downloads and extra features for a monthly fee.
Are Telegram messages encrypted, and can Telegram be traced?
Regular chats, groups and channels use client-server encryption: the connection is encrypted, but Telegram's servers hold the messages and can read them. Only Secret Chats, which are one-to-one and device-bound, use end-to-end encryption, and groups cannot be end-to-end encrypted at all. That is the design that makes the cloud sync work and it is the honest answer to "are Telegram messages encrypted": in transit yes, at rest only in Secret Chats.
On tracing: Telegram accounts are tied to a phone number, usernames can hide that number from other users, and Telegram's policy is to disclose user data to authorities only under valid legal requests, which it began doing more broadly after 2024. A user's phone number is visible to other users only if their privacy settings allow it.
Can Telegram be hacked?
Accounts get taken over through SIM swapping and phishing of the login code far more often than through any flaw in the app. Two-step verification (a password in addition to the SMS code) closes most of that. Telegram's cloud design means a stolen session sees everything except Secret Chats, so the Active Sessions screen is worth checking.
Will Telegram shut down?
There is no announced plan to. Telegram is profitable on Premium, ads and its TON-linked products, reported $870 million in revenue for the first half of 2025, and has faced country-level blocks (Russia 2018 to 2020, Iran, and others) rather than shutdowns. The legal case against its founder in France in 2024 is the most cited risk and did not interrupt the service.
Telegram for business and data export
Groups of tens of thousands of members and channels of millions are where Telegram's business value sits, and the questions that follow are practical: who is in this group, what was said last month, which files were shared. Telegram Desktop exports a chat's history as HTML or JSON. The Mastros Telegram extension exports members, messages, contacts and media from any chat you can open to CSV or Excel, in your browser, with no API key. See Best Telegram scrapers 2026 for the full comparison.
FAQ
How many people use Telegram in 2026?
Over 1 billion monthly and about 500 million daily, per Telegram's own announcements in 2025.
Which country uses Telegram the most?
India by downloads; Russia and Iran by share of messaging. Estimates for India range from 84 to 120 million users.
How many Telegram Premium users are there?
15 million as of May 2025, about 1.5% of monthly users.
What is the biggest Telegram channel?
Hamster Kombat's announcement channel peaked near 60 million subscribers in 2024 and was around 26 million in May 2026. Telegram's own Tips channel is around 10.9 million.
Is Telegram free?
Yes. Premium is optional and paid monthly.
Can Telegram users see my phone number?
Only if your privacy settings allow it. The default shows it to contacts; you can restrict it to nobody and use a username instead.
Sources
Pavel Durov on X (March and May 2025); TechCrunch on daily users (October 2025); Financial Times on H1 2025 revenue; Statista on downloads and Premium; DemandSage Telegram statistics (2025 to 2026); Backlinko Telegram statistics (2026); SQ Magazine Telegram statistics (July 2026); BeInCrypto on the Hamster Kombat channel; DataReportal for time-in-app comparisons. Last verified September 8, 2026.