The Desktop client is a fork of Telegram Desktop, a different codebase from the Android client and with a smaller set of options. Everything below lives under Settings → Mercurygram unless a section says otherwise, and is off by default unless the Default column says otherwise. Options marked pre-release are not in the current stable build yet.
Secret chats
Upstream Telegram Desktop has no secret chats at all: the end-to-end encrypted chats that the mobile apps offer have never been implemented there. Mercurygram Desktop adds them, so a secret chat started on your phone is reachable from the computer.
Start one from Start secret chat in a contact's menu. The chat waits until the other side comes online to complete the key exchange, then behaves like the mobile one: an Encryption key fingerprint you can compare out of band, an optional self-destruct timer, and deletion that can cover both sides.
This is work in progress. The encryption core is covered by tests, but the feature is not yet at the polish level of the rest of the app; treat it as usable rather than finished, and keep the phone as the reference client.
General
| Option | What it does | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Show IDs in profile | Adds the user or chat ID to Profile Info. | Off |
| Hide stories | Removes the stories bar from the chat list entirely. | Off |
| Delete for everyone by default | Pre-ticks "Delete for everyone" in the delete dialog. You can still untick it. | Off |
| Message details menu | Adds a Message details entry to the message right-click menu, showing the message and peer IDs, the date and the author. | Off |
| Hide "All" folder tab | Removes the All folder tab from the folder strip. | Off |
| Hide Premium promo | Hides the Telegram Premium, Stars, TON, Business and gift rows in Settings. Unlocks nothing and does not touch sponsored messages. | Off |
| Launch folder | The chat list opens on the folder you pick. A folder that no longer exists falls back to the default. | Default folder |
Media
| Option | What it does | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Show all recent stickers | Lifts the 20-entry cap on the recent stickers row, showing every recent sticker the app has stored. | Off |
| Send large photos | Uploads photos at up to 2560px instead of 1280px. | Off |
Privacy
Opt-in mitigations that keep queries and drafts off Telegram's servers.
| Option | What it does | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Disable global search | Search stops looking up public usernames, channels and messages across Telegram, and only covers your own chats and contacts. In-chat search is unaffected. | Off |
| Disable link previews | Stops the app fetching web page previews while composing, and marks outgoing messages so the server generates none either, so Telegram's servers never load the links you type or paste. Previews on messages you receive are unaffected. | Off |
| Disable AI text editor | Hides the AI button in the compose field, and disables its shortcut, so your draft is never sent to Telegram's AI service. | Off |
| Disable AI summaries | Hides the AI Summary button on incoming messages, so their text is never sent to Telegram's AI service. | Off |
| Open links in browser | Link clicks open the page in your browser instead of Instant View, which is rendered by Telegram's servers. The explicit Instant View button still works. | Off |
Elsewhere in the app
| Option | Where | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Lock when window is closed or minimized | Settings → Privacy and Security → Local passcode | Locks the app as soon as the last window goes to the tray or is minimized, instead of waiting for the auto-lock timer. Needs a local passcode. |
| Remove sponsored messages | Settings → Advanced → Experimental settings, under Mercurygram | Hides sponsored messages in channels. Kept behind Experimental on purpose: Telegram's API terms ask clients not to interfere with them, so it is yours to enable at your own discretion. Restarts the app. |
Always on
Some of the fork is not a toggle. These behaviours are always active.
Premium gates removed
- Eight accounts instead of three.
- Free folder reordering, including moving "All chats" off the first position.
Interface
- Stickers / GIFs / Games / Inline bots are four independent group permissions instead of Telegram's single bundled "Stickers & GIFs" toggle, both in the group defaults and in the per-member restriction editor.
- Clicking a mention opens the profile even when the app has never been told who that user is, for instance in a message restored from the local cache.
- The animated 🍑 emoji, restored. pre-release
Builds and updates
Windows, macOS and Linux builds come from GitHub Releases, including arm64 builds for Windows and Linux that upstream does not ship, and Linux also has a Flathub package and a Fedora Copr build against the distribution's own libraries.
Because this is an unofficial fork, the builds are signed with Mercurygram's own update keys and the in-app updater points at the Mercurygram release server, not Telegram's. The Telegram API credentials are supplied at build time and are never committed, so anyone building from source uses their own.
Fixes carried ahead of upstream
The fork also carries fixes that are not Mercurygram features: collapsed community members no longer show up twice in folders that match by chat type, a use-after-free when leaving the admin log with the back button, a build failure on aarch64 in the chat exporter, and a workaround for the webkitgtk renderer crash that took out every in-app webview (bot mini apps, payments, Instant View, web login) on some Linux graphics setups.