🏆 iOS Contest 2025

Prize fund: Up to $50,000
Deadline: 23:59 Dubai time on December 26, 2025
Who can participate: Everyone

📱 Telegram is hosting a contest for iOS developers to bring Liquid Glass effects to older versions of iOS. The winner will get a chance to join the Telegram Team.

💸 Developers at Telegram can earn up to $1,000,000 per year before taxes.

THE TASK

Implement custom versions of some of the Liquid Glass effects and the relevant interface flows into Telegram for iOS so these appearances work on iOS 18 and older.

You must precisely replicate the animations and look and feel (highlight on tap, scale-up, bounce, and stretching) on the glass elements. This applies in particular to:

– The tab bar
Omit background blur behind the bar itself, while preserving the glass lenses’ ability to blur the bar’s own content.

– Buttons
This includes attach menu icon, voice and video message recording buttons, etc.

– Switches and sliders
Only the moving element itself should apply blur.

Contest Requirements:

– Support for iOS 18 is mandatory.
– No third-party UI frameworks or new dependencies are allowed.
– The submission must be consistent with the existing Telegram for iOS codebase. You may reuse what is already included in the app's codebase.
– Changes must not negatively affect performance, memory usage, or app stability.

Evaluation:
During the evaluation stage, submissions will be tested on a broad range of devices and iOS versions (13-26). In addition to aesthetic accuracy and appeal, we will evaluate:
– Performance;
– Memory consumption;
– Battery impact.

Submissions:

We will announce detailed submission instructions closer to the deadline. The final submission must be your implementation integrated into Telegram for iOS, not a standalone demo app.

Telegram Contest for Artists: Submissions

Your submissions will have two core parts:

1. A Telegram channel – where you post:
– All gift models you created, one by one as separate stickers (please combine them into a single sticker pack with the help of @stickers). Should you be unable to meet the requirements for animation artwork, post a video recording instead.

2. A .zip archive – which must contain:
– Your static models as .png + .ai files
or
– Your animated models as .tgs + .aep files
or both

Note: Your channel may stay private until the deadline. Make sure you assign it a username after the deadline while not revoking the original private link you will be submitting. There is no need to upload archives from step 2 to the channel.

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ℹ️ We will announce SEPARATELY once @ContestBot will be ready to accept your submissions. In the meantime make sure you will have your channels and archives prepared.

🚨 Last Call

The deadline is in less than 6 hours.

Start uploading your work now. A submission is considered successful only after the archive has been fully uploaded.

Do not postpone your submission until the very last moment.

Late submissions will not be accepted.

🏆 Telegram iOS Contest 2025: Results

💎 This contest was a rare case where we ourselves tried to solve the same task we outlined in the competition. We started at almost the same time and achieved a satisfactory result within a week.

😎 We hoped that some of the participants would achieve a similar result using the same approach, and we were glad to see that this indeed happened.

😑 Curiously, this competition also proved that more and more people are getting their hands on the latest AI tools, though so far this has not helped them much – several AI-slop entries were discarded as worthless.

🤲 We indeed had some fun testing all your apps, enjoying all those transitions and glassy effects. Thank you once again for all the contributions. We are glad that more and more of you have the courage to participate in our contests.

Enough said: meet the winners!

1st PLACE – $7,000
🥇 Hip Mantis
🥇 Bold Shark

2nd PLACE – $4,500
🥈 Desert Panda
🥈 Merry Goat
🥈 Eager Duck

3rd PLACE – $3,000
🥉 Merry Python
🥉 Hip Hyena
🥉 Ace Rat
🥉 Suave Gorilla

BONUS PLACE – $1,000
🏅 Funky Starfish
🏅 Busy Sheep
🏅 Neat Lion
🏅 Chic Zebra
🏅 Crazy Rabbit
🏅 Hip Butterfly
🏅 Sturdy Hamster
🏅 Jolly Gull
🏅 Bold Wasp
🏅 Merry Hedgehog
🏅 Lucky Crab
🏅 Quirky Monkey
🏅 Nimble Gopher
🏅 Ace Wolf

That's all for today, more results (and new contests) are on the way.

💎 Blockchain Contest, Round 2

Telegram and TON Core announce a new bug bounty contest!

Prize Fund: Up to $100,000
Deadline: 23:59, March 27 (Dubai time)
Task: Analyze TON’s new consensus algorithm for potential vulnerabilities.

Reports on other validator bugs are also welcome, but consensus-related issues remain the top priority.

Prize Fund Distribution
The total prize fund, up to $100,000, will be allocated based on each participant's overall contribution.

Guidelines and Submissions
For detailed instructions, contest rules, and submission guidelines, refer to this document.

Additional Opportunities
Winners may have the chance to join the Telegram or TON Core teams.

🏆 Design Contest 2025: Results

🧠 Our most challenging Design Contest to date turned out to be a great success. This time, designers faced the complex task of crafting not just a standalone feature, but the foundation of an entirely new way to communicate on Telegram – and to manage that flow.

🌈 It was truly rewarding to come across so many gems out of 192 submissions – thank you. We spent more than a hundred hours reviewing each one, and dozens more discussing the ideas that stood out.

With so many strong concepts in play, none decisively outperformed the others – so no one secured 1st place.

💰 As a token of recognition of the effort participants put in, we are boosting the total prize fund from the initial $50,000 to $75,500 – an increase of over 50%.

Now finally, meet the winners!

2nd PLACE – $5,000
🥈 Sexy Leopard | Channel
🥈 Brave Flamingo | Channel
🥈 Strict Crow | Channel
🥈 Desert Bass | Channel
🥈 Cuddly Turtle | Channel
🥈 Humble Cockroach | Channel
🥈 Merry Bat | Channel

3rd PLACE – $2,000
🥉 Eager Duck | Channel
🥉 Nimble Kitten | Channel
🥉 Mighty Crab | Channel
🥉 Eager Mantis | Channel
🥉 Sunny Mink | Channel
🥉 Caring Eagle | Channel
🥉 Shiny Fish | Channel
🥉 Gifted Puma | Channel
🥉 Nimble Sheep | Channel
🥉 Crazy Gnat | Channel
🥉 Mighty Falcon | Channel
🥉 Noble Swallow | Channel

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4th PLACE – $750
🎖 Cute Lemur | Channel
🎖 Bold Fish | Channel
🎖 Magic Gorilla | Channel
🎖 Fit Tapir | Channel
🎖 Classy Skunk | Channel
🎖 Kooky Crow | Channel
🎖 Witty Fox | Channel
🎖 Slim Giraffe | Channel
🎖 Sweet Flamingo | Channel
🎖 Noble Ant | Channel
🎖 Sweet Duck | Channel
🎖 Brave Chicken | Channel
🎖 Humble Cock | Channel
🎖 Sleek Piranha | Channel
🎖 Sleek Kangaroo | Channel
🎖 Agile Monkey | Channel
🎖 Quirky Frog | Channel
🎖 Sexy Ladybird | Channel
🎖 Dandy Snail | Channel
🎖 Crazy Peacock | Channel
🎖 Jolly Elk | Channel
🎖 Sleek Mink | Channel

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Enjoy the rest of your Friday and have a great weekend ahead!

🏆 Design Contest 2026, Round 2

Deadline: 23:59 Dubai time @ May 17, 2026
Who can participate: only those who secured 🥈2nd or 🥉3rd places in Round 1.

📱 Telegram announces an express round of the Design Contest for selected winners of our previous competition.

The Task:
Identify weak spots in existing features of our official apps (Android, iOS, Telegram Desktop) and propose improvements – fixing the flaws and making the target features more elegant, convenient, simple, clear, or even more modern.

Contest Requirements:

1. You may submit up to 2 features.

2. Submissions must be in Before / After format.

3. Static only mockups are acceptable when no animation changes are involved.

4. Anything is within the scope – copy, spacing, colors, visuals – as long as the change noticeably improves the user experience.

Standout submissions will receive additional reward of up to $1,000 per each feature you improve. The best of you may get a chance to join the Telegram Team.

Submissions:
We will publish instructions how to submit your work closer to the deadline.

💎 Blockchain Contest, Round 2: Results

We awarded $100,400 to the winners of TON Consensus Challenge.

The core task was to find potential flaws in TON's new consensus algorithm – though participants were welcome to report any other flaws they came across.

All these efforts from the contestants helped us make the algorithm flawless.

1st PLACE
🥇 Happy Turtle – $19,800
🥇 Shiny Giraffe – $18,200
🥇 Dandy Ram – $13,200

2nd PLACE
🥈 Mighty Yak – $8,800
🥈 Kingly Rabbit – $8,400
🥈 Fit Piranha – $6,400
🥈 Gifted Ram – $4,400
🥈 Cool Fly – $4,400
🥈 Swift Gecko – $4,400

3rd PLACE
🥈 Witty Gorilla – $2,200
🥈 Young Walrus – $2,200
🥈 Quick Crab – $2,000
🥈 Kingly Crow – $2,000
🥈 Busy Unicorn – $2,000
🥈 Rich Phoenix – $2,000

Congratulations to the winners! Stay tuned for our next contests.

🏆 Contest for Artists: Results

😌 Our first artist contest of this scale drew hundreds of creative minds.

🤝 The review phase was intense and lengthy. We went through every submission with care and were thrilled by how many outstanding entries we found.

📬 Some artists have also been approached directly to explore further cooperation opportunities – in addition to their share of the prize fund.

Meet the winners!

Funky Clam | Channel – $5,110
Quick Lion | Channel – $3,010
Noble Bat | Channel – $2,660
Regal Gorilla | Channel – $2,380
Magic Gorilla | Channel – $1,960
Stone Mule | Channel – $1,890
Stout Lynx | Channel – $1,820
Sharp Wombat | Channel – $1,400
Dreamy Bee | Channel – $1,400
Mighty Leopard | Channel – $1,190
Agile Sloth | Channel – $1,120
Suave Leopard | Channel – $1,120
Sunny Unicorn | Channel – $1,120
Gentle Scorpion | Channel – $1,050
Suave Spider | Channel – $980
Small Horse | Channel – $980
Fluffy Fly | Channel – $910
Mad Puma | Channel – $840
Posh Dodo | Channel – $840
Night Cockroach | Channel – $840
Tactful Goat | Channel – $770
Cute Elk | Channel – $770
Merry Spider | Channel – $700
Wise Swan | Channel – $700
Posh Yak | Channel – $700
Fierce Mantis | Channel – $700
Suave Gull | Channel – $700
Shiny Fish | Channel – $700
Shiny Zebra | Channel – $700
Cuddly Starfish | Channel – $630
Small Tiger | Channel – $630
Bright Frog | Channel – $630
Witty Beetle | Channel – $560
Perfect Jaguar | Channel – $560
Happy Owl | Channel – $560

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