Telegram Bot API 3.0: Payment, language and more!

by Daniel LaRusso · Published 7 May, 2017 · Updated 8 May, 2017

this article is just a draft, update has not been published yet 😉

Payment API is finally here! Telegram is updating the bot API with a lot of new features, this is the major update since April 2016. The payment API is the major feature of this update.

What Are Payments?

Basically Bot Payments is a way for bots to accept payments from their users worldwide. In detail, it’s a new platform for payment providers from all over the world, where they can connect to the platform.

Bot Payment API

A way for bots to accept payments from their users worldwide. Imagine a world where you can order a flying spaghetti monster t-shirt, pay for a pair of shoes, hire a car or refill your metrocard just by tapping a few buttons on Telegram. Payments will be very easy to use, every bot will have a pay button: Once you tap Pay, you be asked to fill in the credit card information (only once) and confirm the payment. After that, ordering stuff from bots will take only two taps!

Telegram is an open platform, so bot developers can implement the necessary APIs and accept payments from users starting right now, without lengthly confirmations. If you’re a bot developer, check out the docs here!

Bot payments are a platform for payment providers all over the world. Developers can choose between all available payments providers, selecting the one already used by the payer or the one with the lowest commission.

Each payment goes directly from the user to the bot developer. Telegram does not take any commission from the payments and doesn’t profit from these transactions. Telegram don’t see or store the credit card data. This makes it impossible for Telegram to handle complaints or cashbacks – so the disputed payments will be dealt by the bot developers, the payment providers and the banks.