Concept
Telegram
Project type
UX, UI, Concept
Platform
Windows Phone
The WhatsApp Alternative
When Facebook bought Whatsapp earlier this year for measly 16 Billion dollars, there was an uproar. People were concerned what would happen with their data since many don’t trust Facebook in the first place. A lot of folks began or wanted to switch from Whatsapp to alternative messaging clients such as Telegram and Threema.
Since Telegram is open sourced, we decided to develop a client for Windows Phone because all the available apps are exactly the same. Functionality and looks wise.
We canned the project because Telegram just didn’t take off as much as we would’ve liked. So here are the design concepts!
Lettergram
We wanted to name our app something similar to Telegram. So we came up with Lettergram.
The basic idea was to have a messaging app that looks cool and easy on the eyes and performs very fast, since you’d be using it a lot. We settled on a light blue cloud/sky theme that goes pretty good with the Telegram paper plane icon.
First launch
When you launch Lettergram for the first time, you would be guided through the basic features and how to set up the client with you phone number in a short tutorial.
All you have to do is swipe through the tutorial or jump right ahead in the setup.
Tutorial
Telegram features
Contacts
The contacts screen has an option to switch between different views on how the contacts are displayed. There are three views to choose from.
- 2×2 grid with large contact images and status info
- 3×3 grid with smaller contact images
- Listview with contact thumbnails and status info
Different views
Each contact thumb could also update itself with new info, such as when a user begins to type something or changes his/her profile picture.
2×2
3×3
List
Chat view
A clean and modern approach. No borders, no shadows, no unnecessary chrome.
Chatting doesn’t have to look boring
Instead of having a black and boring background, we decided again to go with the sky/clouds theme and spruce up the whole messaging experience. There’s also an option to use some preselected backgrounds or just any picture that a user has on its Windows Phone.
You’d also get the usual emoticons/emojis and inline images and videos in the messages itself.
Current chats
Chat (no messages)
Ongoing conversation
Any interest?
Looking back we’d probably be still interested in developing Lettergram/Telegram for Windows Phone if there was a lot of demand for such app or Telegram themselves wanted to collaborate.
Just shoot me a mail and we’ll work it out! 🙂
