In light of what's happened to Durov and possibly seeing Telegram compromised, I'm doubling my efforts to find a new main messenger. Before you start, not Signal as it's a bad fit for the needs of me, my family and friends.
So what do I need?
The ability to run on multiple devices. Me, my family and friends all have multiple Android devices.
The ability to run on desktop. Linux and Windows.
Built in sticker repository. What can I say, I like to lazy flirt.
Animated Emoji. I like my messenger experience vibrant.
Material You. Again with the vibrancy, but also, it's a sign of modernity.
Phone number linking. My family and friends are lazy as hell.
Synchronized chats. I don't mind self hosting a bridge, but the ability to see messages on multiple devices is a must.
Voice Messages
Video Calls
Group Video Calls
Stories integrated into as first class citizens
Private. If you suggest WhatsApp, I'm assuming you're either stupid or a troll.
Sticker repository? lol, Telegram has that market cornered and you know it :)
https://matrix.org/ is probably the only reasonable solution to your problem but reading between the lines you're inferring that Telegram is dead in the water.
I'm a popcorn fanantic and await to see the, corns?
We would not recommend Matrix for security considering the recently admitted their old encryption code was bad and a lot of clients are still using their old encryption code: