telegram-enhanced

claude-telegram-enhanced

Enhanced Telegram channel plugin for Claude Code — adds topic-per-session routing, response streaming via drafts, and topic lifecycle management.

Forked from anthropics/claude-plugins-official/telegram. Fully backwards-compatible with the original plugin.

What's new

Feature	Description
Shared polling daemon	A single background daemon owns the getUpdates poll. Multiple plugin instances consume from per-topic inboxes — no 409 conflicts.
Topic routing	Bind a Claude session to a single Telegram topic. Multiple sessions share one bot without conflicts.
Auto-create topics	Set TELEGRAM_TOPIC_NAME and a topic is created on boot, named after your worktree/session.
Response streaming	send_draft tool uses Telegram's sendMessageDraft API to show responses building in real-time.
Topic lifecycle	create_topic, edit_topic, delete_topic tools for managing topics programmatically.
Scoped indicators	Typing indicators and ack reactions appear in the correct topic, not just the top-level chat.

Architecture

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  daemon.ts (single process per machine)         │
│  Owns the getUpdates poll, runs gate(),         │
│  writes JSON envelopes to per-topic dirs        │
└───────────┬─────────────┬───────────────────────┘
            │             │
   topics/41/       topics/55/
            │             │
┌───────────┴───┐ ┌───────┴───────────┐
│  server.ts    │ │  server.ts        │
│  (worktree A) │ │  (worktree B)     │
│  MCP server   │ │  MCP server       │
│  watches 41/  │ │  watches 55/      │
└───────────────┘ └───────────────────┘

Each server.ts is an MCP server spawned by Claude Code. It does not poll Telegram — it watches its topic's inbox directory via fs.watch + polling fallback. The daemon is spawned automatically on first use and persists across sessions.

Prerequisites

• Bun — curl -fsSL https://bun.sh/install | bash
• A Telegram bot token (see setup below)

Telegram setup

1. Create a bot

1. Open @BotFather on Telegram
2. Send /newbot, pick a name and username
3. Copy the token (123456789:AAHfiqksKZ8...)

2. Enable topics (Threaded Mode)

Topics require a group chat — they don't work in private bot chats.

1. In BotFather, send /mybots → select your bot → Bot Settings → Threaded Mode → Enable
2. Also turn off Group Privacy: Bot Settings → Group Privacy → Turn off (so the bot receives all messages, not just commands and mentions)

3. Create a group chat

1. Create a new Telegram group (or use an existing one)
2. Enable Topics: Group settings → Topics → toggle on
3. Add your bot to the group and make it an admin (it needs admin rights to create/close topics and react to messages)

4. Get the group's chat ID

Add @userinfobot to the group temporarily — it will print the chat ID (a negative number like -1001234567890). Remove it after.

Alternatively, forward any message from the group to @userinfobot in a private chat.

Plugin installation

1. Register the marketplace

claude plugin marketplace add vladzima/claude-telegram-enhanced

2. Install the plugin

claude plugin install telegram-enhanced@claude-telegram-enhanced

3. Configure the token

/telegram:configure 123456789:AAHfiqksKZ8...

Or write it directly:

mkdir -p ~/.claude/channels/telegram
echo 'TELEGRAM_BOT_TOKEN=123456789:AAHfiqksKZ8...' > ~/.claude/channels/telegram/.env

4. Launch with the channel flag

claude --channels plugin:telegram-enhanced@claude-telegram-enhanced

Note: If this is the first time loading a development channel, you'll see a safety prompt — select "I am using this for local development" and press Enter.

5. Pair with the bot

DM your bot on Telegram — it replies with a 6-character code. In Claude Code:

/telegram:access pair <code>

Then lock access so only you can use the bot:

/telegram:access policy allowlist

You only need to pair once. The pairing persists across sessions.

Topic routing

Each Claude session can be bound to a dedicated Telegram topic using environment variables:

Variable	Description
TELEGRAM_TOPIC_ID	Bind to an existing topic by its message_thread_id.
TELEGRAM_TOPIC_NAME	Create a new topic with this name on boot (requires TELEGRAM_TOPIC_CHAT_ID).
TELEGRAM_TOPIC_CHAT_ID	The chat ID to create the topic in (used with TELEGRAM_TOPIC_NAME).

When bound, the session only receives messages from its topic and all replies are automatically routed there.

Example: one bot, many sessions