News

Telegram Introduces Support For Group Video Calls & Many Other Features

The biggest limitation at the moment is the fact that group video calls are limited to the first 30 people who join a voice chat.

Published

5 years ago

June 29, 2021

Joanna Melki

telegram introduces support for group video calls and many other features

Telegram users have a good reason to celebrate because their favorite instant messaging software now supports group video calls.

To use the new feature, you need to first start a voice chat by tapping or clicking the hamburger menu in the profile of any group where you are an admin and selecting the Start Voice Chat option. From there, simply tap the camera icon to switch your video on.

“Tap on any video to make it full screen,” explains Telegram on its blog. “If you pin a video, it will stay focused as new users join the call and turn on their cameras.”

The Telegram app lets you seamlessly share your screen with others, and you don’t even have to turn off your camera feed. The screen sharing option can be accessed by clicking the hamburger menu icon during a group video call. The same menu is also where you can find the toggle for the improved noise suppression option.

Telegram

All in all, the group video calls feature seems to be polished and well-implemented, which isn’t all that surprising considering that Telegram first promised to release it by the end of last year, later extending the deadline to May.

The biggest limitation at the moment is the fact that group video calls are limited to the first 30 people who join a voice chat. Telegram is already working on increasing this limit, but we don’t know how long it will take.

Also Read: The Top 3 VPN Services For Android (2023 Edition)

Other notable features introduced alongside group video calls include algorithmically generated animated backgrounds for chats, seamless message sending animations, login information reminders, new animated emoji, improved creation of new sticker packs, two new app icons on iOS, and better communication with bots.

Telegram currently has around 500 million users around the world, and new features such as these are guaranteed to make its user base grow even larger.

News

Visa’s Return To Syria Starts With A Test And A Bank In Lebanon

Foreign visitors will be the first users to benefit, but whether Syria’s own banks and cardholders follow is still an open question.

Published

2 weeks ago

August 27, 2026

Dana Saadeh

visa's return to syria starts with a test and a bank in lebanon

Visa is returning to Syria. Its first live international card transaction in the country was a test rather than a launch, and the milestone event ran through a Lebanese bank.

The acquirer (the bank on the merchant’s side of a card payment) was Fransabank Lebanon, with Paymera as the other named partner. Nadim Moujaes, who heads a Fransabank Group subsidiary, describes the test as both the culmination of “longstanding efforts to link Syria back to international payment networks” and “the first step in a larger path”.

Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa makes the first electronic payment in Syria using a @Visa card at a store in Damascus, following the lifting of US sanctions on Syria. pic.twitter.com/lpAN7nQ6Fc

— Tech Magazine (@TechMGZN) August 27, 2026

“We are excited to have successfully tested live transactions today as we plan to enable international visitors to use their Visa cards while in Syria,” says Leila Serhan, Visa’s senior vice president and group country manager for the North Africa, Levant and Pakistan region. Although a significant first step, that plan doesn’t come with a hard date for when a visitor’s card will work normally.

Mohammed Safwat Raslan, governor of the Central Bank of Syria, says the test paves the way for international card acceptance in Syria and that maintaining strong compliance, risk management and operational controls will remain essential. Serhan likewise stresses that Visa has worked within applicable legal, regulatory and compliance requirements. For a test transaction, it seems there was a great deal of attention paid to the rules, with the entire operation being carefully managed.

Also Read: Lebanon’s 5G Era Begins With 150 Stations And A $1M Budget

The test is the latest step in a sequence that began in December 2025, when Visa announced a strategic roadmap to support Syria’s integration into the global digital economy. In February 2026 it hosted its first industry gathering of banks, ecosystem partners and policymakers in Damascus and, the same month, signed an agreement with Syria’s Ministry of Communications and Information Technology in San Francisco.

Michel Kattouah, Paymera’s CEO, called the test “the return of international card acceptance,” but while that’s positive news, there’s no word yet on when a Syrian bank will issue a Visa card to a Syrian customer.