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Telegram has positioned itself as a safe and secure messaging app. Although your messages should be protected from modern security threats, you might have other privacy concerns. Whether you’d like to protect your messages from prying eyes or simply clean up your chat list, there are several ways to go about it.
Keep reading to learn how you can hide a Telegram chat without having to delete it.
How to Hide a Telegram Chat on an iPhone
When choosing the best route for hiding a Telegram chat, consider what you’d like to conceal. There are ways to hide previous conversations you no longer want anyone to see or individual messages within a conversation.
Hide a Telegram Chat by Archiving It
Archiving conversations on Telegram is the quickest way to organize your chats and remove inactive conversations. You can also archive chats to stop anyone from seeing them and ensure they don’t reappear when you receive a new message. Telegram lets you archive messages using two methods.
If you’d like to archive a single chat, group, or channel, you can do so in two simple steps:
- Swipe left on the conversation until three buttons appear over it.
- Select the “Archive” option.
Although you could repeat these two steps for every chat you’d like to archive, the second method is quicker and more convenient. To archive multiple conversations at once, do the following:
- Click “Edit” on the “Chats” screen.
- Check the conversations you wish to archive.
- Hit “Archive” at the bottom of your screen.
The selected chats will be filed in the “Archived Chats” folder. The folder will be pinned on top of your conversations. If you’d like to hide the folder, follow these steps:
- Swipe left on the folder.
- Tap the “Hide” button when it appears.
Now that you’ve hidden your chats, you might want to ensure they stay hidden. If you receive a new message in one of your archived chats, the conversation will reappear on the “Chats” screen. Only a muted conversation will stay hidden for as long as you like.
Here’s how to mute a conversation:
- Navigate to the conversation you want to mute.
- Click on the name at the top of the chat.
- Select the “Mute” option.
- Choose the duration.
If you’d like to disable notifications for that conversation permanently, choose the “Mute Forever” option.
Hide a Telegram Chat in Saved Messages
Telegram introduced the Saved Messages feature to help you bookmark important messages. However, you can also use it to hide individual messages from a conversation.
- Long-tap on the message you want to hide.
- Hit “Forward” on the pop-up menu.
- Select “Saved Messages.”
The chosen message will be sent away to a separate “Saved Messages” folder. But the message will also stay in the original chat unless you delete it. Follow these steps to delete a message:
- Long-press the message.
- Click on the trash can icon in the bottom-left corner of your screen.
- Tap “Delete.”
After choosing who to delete the message for, it will be hidden from your conversation. If you’d like to reread it, visit the “Saved Messages” folder at the top of your screen. Although you can’t hide this folder or retrieve the messages from it, it’s the only way to hide individual messages from a chat.
How to Hide a Telegram Chat on an Android Device
If you’re fond of using Telegram, you know that conversations can pile up quickly. Hiding them can help you restore order to your chat list, prioritize active conversations, and take care of your privacy concerns. You can choose between hiding chats one by one or in bulk, and whole conversation or only select messages.
Hide a Telegram Chat by Archiving It
Although Telegram introduced the Archive feature to help users organize their active and inactive conversations, it can also serve as an excellent privacy tool.
There are two ways to archive a Telegram chat. You can use the first when you want to archive an individual conversation or group.
- Locate the conversation you wish to hide.
- Swipe left on it to archive the conversation.
However, swiping will not work for archiving if you’ve set up Telegram folders on your Android. Additionally, you might want to archive multiple conversations at once. If that’s the case, the second method might serve you better.
- Long-press on the chat(s) you want to archive.
- Tap the three-dot menu icon in the top-right corner.
- Click “Archive.”
The “Archived Chats” folder will pop up on top of your chats. You can hide the folder by swiping left on it or pressing and holding until the “Hide above the list” option appears.
Your chats have now been safely tucked away, but not for long. A new message will take the conversation from the “Archived Chats” folder back to your regular chats. The only way to ensure an archived chat will stay hidden for as long as you like is to mute it.
Here’s how to disable notifications for a Telegram chat on your Android:
- Press and hold the chat.
- Click on the three-dot menu icon in the top-right corner.
- Select “Mute Notifications.”
- Choose how long to mute the chat for.
If you want your chat to stay hidden forever, choose the “Disable” option.
Hide a Telegram Chat in Saved Messages
Saved Messages is a helpful Telegram feature that allows you to save individual messages to a separate folder. You can use it to your advantage if you’d like to hide only some messages and not the entire conversation.
Follow these steps to save a Telegram message:
- Find the message(s) you want to hide.
- Press and hold the message.
- Hit the “Forward” button at the bottom right.
- Tap “Saved Messages.”
Once you’ve moved the message to the “Saved Messages” folder, you can delete it from the original conversation. To delete a Telegram message:
- Long-press the message.
- Click on the trash can icon in the top-right corner of your screen.
- Tap “Delete” in the pop-up window.
Note that you can neither move the saved message back to the conversation nor hide the “Saved Messages” folder.
How to Hide a Telegram Chat on a PC
Telegram stands out among its rivals as a cloud-based messenger app, meaning your chats sync across your devices. If you’ve taken steps to hide your conversations on your mobile app, your desktop app will follow suit.
In case you’re only using Telegram on your PC, you can still hide as many chats as you’d like by archiving them.
It doesn’t matter whether you’re using the Telegram app or Telegram Web, you can archive chats on your PC in two easy steps:
- Right-click the chat you wish to hide.
- Choose “Archive” from the menu.
The conversation will move to the “Archived chats” folder at the top of your chats on the left panel.
Remember that the chat will stay archived until you receive a message. If you’re anticipating new messages you wish to remain hidden in a chat, your best option is to mute that conversation.
- Right-click on the chat you wish to mute.
- Select “Disable Notifications.”
- Choose the mute duration.
- Press “OK.”
If you don’t want to deal with the chat again, set the mute duration to “Forever.”
Hide Away
Although deleting a chat is always an option, you may want to retain a conversation, but keep it out of your way. This guide has shown you how to hide an entire Telegram conversation or individual messages in a few taps and swipes. Give it a try and keep your account organized and your mind at ease.
Have you ever tried to hide a Telegram chat? How did you do it? Let us know in the comments section below.
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