Telegram Focus - a productivity-focused modification of Telegram Desktop

Telegram Focus is a modification of the official Telegram Desktop client. It shows only the chats and stories you have manually added to an allowlist.

The filtering happens only inside Telegram Focus. It does not unsubscribe you from chats, change your Telegram folders, or affect how chats appear in other Telegram clients.

In every other respect, it is the same fully functional Telegram Desktop client as the corresponding upstream version.

You can still doomscroll on your phone, while staying clean on your desktop!

How to use it

1. Install Telegram Focus.
2. Create a chat folder named Allowlist in your Telegram account. Use your phone or another regular Telegram client to create and manage it.
3. Add the chats you want to see on desktop to that folder.
4. Open Telegram Focus. Only chats and stories from your allowlist will be shown.

FRIENDLY WARNING: Use only one Telegram desktop client at a time — either Telegram Focus or the regular Telegram Desktop client.

Telegram Focus uses the same tdata folder as the regular client, so running both at the same time may cause conflicts with your Telegram sessions.

Installation

macOS

I mainly develop for Linux and Windows, so I do not have an Apple Developer account or the tools needed to notarize the app yet. The DMG still installs normally, but macOS may ask for one extra confirmation before the first launch.

1. Download the latest DMG from the Releases page.
2. Open the DMG in Finder.
3. Drag Telegram Focus.app into the Applications folder.
4. Open Telegram Focus from Applications.
5. If macOS blocks the first launch, Control-click the app, choose Open, and confirm the action.

FRIENDLY WARNING: Use only one Telegram desktop client at a time — either Telegram Focus or the regular Telegram Desktop client.

Telegram Focus uses the same tdata folder as the regular client, so running both at the same time may cause conflicts with your Telegram sessions.

Linux

Package coming soon.

Windows

Package coming soon.

Building from source

Follow the official build instructions for the Telegram Desktop client. Telegram Desktop is based on the Telegram API and the MTProto secure protocol.

• Windows (32-bit and 64-bit)
• macOS
• GNU/Linux using Docker

The source code is published under GPLv3 with the OpenSSL exception. See the license for details.

Third-party

• Qt 6 (LGPL) and Qt 5.15 (LGPL) slightly patched
• OpenSSL 3.2.1 (Apache License 2.0)
• WebRTC (New BSD License)
• zlib (zlib License)
• LZMA SDK 9.20 (public domain)
• liblzma (public domain)
• Google Breakpad (License)
• Google Crashpad (Apache License 2.0)
• GYP (BSD License)
• Ninja (Apache License 2.0)
• OpenAL Soft (LGPL)
• Opus codec (BSD License)
• FFmpeg (LGPL)
• Guideline Support Library (MIT License)
• Range-v3 (Boost License)
• Open Sans font (Apache License 2.0)
• Vazirmatn font (SIL Open Font License 1.1)
• Emoji alpha codes (MIT License)
• xxHash (BSD License)
• QR Code generator (MIT License)
• CMake (New BSD License)
• Hunspell (LGPL)
• Ada (Apache License 2.0)