The “TON Status in Q1 2026” report published by Messari on June 9 shows that Telegram product revenue settled via Fragment in Q1 totaled $88.5 million. Cross-chain NFT market share grew by 130.4% to 35.5%, driven by demand for Telegram’s Numbers, Usernames, and Gifts.
Telegram Product Revenue Breakdown (Q1 2026)
Telegram product revenue by category settled via Fragment:
Stars (in-app currency): $34.0 million (-30.7% QoQ), accounting for 38.4%
Telegram Ads: $27.7 million (-10.8% QoQ), accounting for 31.3%
Telegram Premium: $14.1 million (-10.1% QoQ), accounting for 15.9%
Numbers + Usernames auctions: $10.5 million (-21.0% QoQ), accounting for 11.9%
Gateway: $1.2 million (-12.9% QoQ), accounting for 1.3%
Upgrade Bots: $589,990 (-3.9% QoQ), accounting for 0.7%
Messari noted that recurring revenue (Premium + Ads) totaled $41.8 million, down only 10.5% quarter-over-quarter, far outperforming the 30.7% decline in discretionary Stars.
MTONGA roadmap progress (post-quarter)
As of the report release, among the seven announced steps of MTONGA (Make TON Great Again), the confirmed milestones completed are: Catchain 2.0 launched on the mainnet on April 9, 2026, achieving sub-second finality (about 400 milliseconds) and about a 10x throughput improvement; in mid-April 2026, it completed a 6x reduction in transaction fees (simple native transfers about $0.001, USDT transfers about $0.0023); in early May 2026, Telegram became the largest validator on TON, staking 2.2 million TON.
The cost of the above upgrades is that the annualized inflation rate rises from 0.6% to 3.6%. Steps 4 through 7 have not been fully disclosed, including Step 4, which plans to rename the native token from Toncoin to Gram (requires a community vote).
FAQ
Why did TON’s Q1 NFT market share grow against the market downturn?
Messari’s report states that TON’s NFT footprint is mainly concentrated in Numbers (anonymous phone numbers), Usernames (accounts), and Gifts (collectible gifts) issued by Telegram. These NFTs operate as actual consumable products within the Telegram ecosystem; demand is driven by functional usage by Telegram users, not speculation. During the same period, NFT trading volumes on Ethereum, Solana, Base, and Polygon all fell significantly.
Why did the inflation rate increase substantially after the TON Catchain 2.0 upgrade?
Messari’s report explains that Catchain 2.0 increases block production speed by about 6x (from about 2.5 seconds down to 400 milliseconds). Since TON uses a design with fixed per-block validator rewards, the faster block time directly increases the unit-time reward issuance, causing the annualized inflation rate to rise from 0.6% to 3.6%. TON chose not to lower per-block rewards to ensure validators receive a higher staked annual yield (from 3.3% to 18.4%).
What is the relationship between Telegram product revenue and TON token holders?
Messari’s report states that Fragment’s revenue does not flow directly to TON token holders; it is instead allocated to Telegram, channel owners, users, and Mini App developers. TON benefits are achieved through demand-side effects: advertisers buy inventory on TON, bidders obtain TON to participate in auctions, and 50% of on-chain Gas fees are burned at the protocol layer.
