In Telegram, the people close to you should come first, not channels

In Telegram, chats with the people close to you and channels sit in the same list, and that list is sorted by the latest message. Channels post more often than people do, so they almost always end up on top, and it’s easy to notice a personal message later than you’d like.

There are several ways to fix this, from a couple of settings in Telegram itself to moving channels into a separate bot. Below they are in order, with what each one gives you and what it costs. Which one suits you depends partly on how many people you message: five chats can simply be pinned, twenty can’t.

Pin the people close to you

Pinned chats stay at the top of the list, however many posts come in after them. Press and hold a chat, or right-click it on a computer, then choose “Pin”. Without Premium you can pin up to five chats in the main list; with Telegram Premium, up to ten (Telegram blog).

This is the quickest way: channels stay where they are, and the people close to you are always on top. But only the ones you pinned. If someone who isn’t on that list writes, say a doctor or an old friend, their message will end up among the channels, just as before.

Mute channels and sort them into folders

This is usually the first thing people do, but it doesn’t move the people close to you any higher.

A muted channel stops distracting you, but it stays in the general list in the same place. A new post comes out, and the channel is above your personal chats again. How to mute all channels at once is covered in our article about the unread counter.

A folder gathers channels into a separate tab. In “Settings”, open “Chat Folders”, create a folder, tap “Add Chats” and under “Chat types” choose “Channels”. Reading channels one after another is more convenient this way. But Telegram still opens on the “All Chats” tab, and there channels and people are just as mixed together.

So muting and folders work well alongside other methods, but on their own they change nothing.

Archive channels with notifications off

The archive removes chats from the main list. The channels don’t disappear: they’re kept separately, and your subscriptions stay.

First mute the channel. A chat with notifications on comes back out of the archive with its very first notification, while a muted chat stays there for good (Telegram blog). Then choose “Archive” in the chat menu. On Android you can select several channels at once with a long press.

Only people and groups will remain in the main list.

There are two downsides. You’ll have to move channels by hand, and every new channel you subscribe to will show up in the general list again. And keeping up with channels in the archive is awkward: you have to go there on purpose, and it’s easy to forget what’s in there.

Open Telegram straight on the people close to you

With Premium you can make any folder the first tab, and Telegram will open on it (Telegram blog). In “Chat Folders”, create a folder for the people close to you and in “Add Chats” pick the people you want one by one or the whole “Contacts” type. If you also want to see people who aren’t in your contacts, add the “Non-Contacts” type. Then press and hold the folder tab, choose “Reorder” and drag it to the first place.

Without Premium this won’t work: “All Chats” always stays first. On the other hand, you don’t have to touch channels at all; they live in the other tabs. The cost of this method is a Premium subscription.

Unsubscribe from what you don’t need

The fewer channels you have, the less they crowd out the people close to you. Go through the list and ask yourself about each channel: would you notice if it disappeared for a week? If not, unsubscribe.

If you only need a channel now and then, for example so you don’t miss an announcement, you don’t have to stay subscribed to it. We explained how to follow it without subscribing in a separate article.

Hand channels over to a bot

The most convenient option: read channels not in Telegram’s general list but in one chat. «Essence» Bot reads public channels itself, so you don’t need to subscribe to them. Add channels to the bot by username or link, and if they’re already in a folder, by the link to that folder. After that you can unsubscribe from the channels in Telegram.

New posts will arrive in a single chat with the bot: each one shows the channel name and has a link to the original. For each channel you can choose a short summary or the original text. A summary helps you see right away what a post is about and decide whether to open the original.

Your chat list will be left with people and one chat with channels. Mute it and open it when you have time.

The bot reads private channels through your connected Telegram account. Discussions under posts stay in the channel itself, and the link to the original takes you to them. For the first five days the bot works for free with five channels; after that you need a paid plan.

What to choose

Muting decides whether a channel distracts you, a folder decides where you read it, and the archive decides whether it’s visible in the main list. Only pinning, the archive, a Premium folder with the people close to you, and moving channels out of Telegram change the first screen. You can combine them like this:

• Only a few people close to you, and channels don’t bother you otherwise: pin those people, and that’s enough.
• Dozens of channels and no Premium: mute the channels, archive them, and pin the people close to you.
• You have Premium: make the folder with the people close to you the first one, and leave channels in their own tabs.
• You’d like to read channels as one stream at a time that suits you: unsubscribe from what you don’t need and hand the rest over to the bot.

Now when you open Telegram, the first thing you see is the people waiting for your reply. The channels haven’t gone anywhere; they’re just queued up behind people.