Russians are flocking to Asian messaging apps following restrictions on Telegram
In Russia, the popularity of Asian messaging apps has surged following restrictions on access to Telegram.
This was reported by Kommersant.
According to MTS AdTech, their monthly audience grew by nearly 60% in March, and overall demand for alternative platforms increased by 50% in the first quarter of 2026.
The Turkish app BiP, South Korea’s KakaoTalk, and China’s WeChat showed the greatest growth.
Specifically, BiP more than doubled its audience in March—by 105%—to 1.68 million users.
KakaoTalk grew by 82% and reached 436,400 users.
WeChat added 15%, and its audience in Russia now exceeds 1.15 million users.
As a reminder, the Russian State Duma has complained about communication issues due to the blocking of Telegram.
Amid attempts to block hostile information resources in Russia, a massive service outage occurred again on April 6, affecting state services in particular.
A similar outage occurred in Russia on April 3; telecom experts directly linked it to the operation of equipment designed to block unwanted resources. Founder Pavel Durov stated that attempts by Russian authorities to restrict VPN usage led to a large-scale failure in the national payment system.
