Telegram

The telegram integrationIntegrations connect and integrate Home Assistant with your devices, services, and more. [Learn more] uses Telegram to deliver notifications from Home Assistant to your Telegram application(s).

Setup example

To create your first Telegram bot, follow these steps:

• Bots are not allowed to contact users. You need to make the first contact from the user for which you want to set up the bot.

1. Tell Telegram to create a bot for you:

   • In Telegram, open a chat with @BotFather and enter /newbot.
   • Follow the instructions on screen and give your bot a name.
   • BotFather will give you a link to your new bot and an HTTP API token.
     • Store the token somewhere safe.

2. To get a chat ID, send any message to the GetIDs bot.

   • Then, enter /start.
   • The bot will return your chat ID and the username.

3. Create a Telegram bot in Home Assistant:

   • Paste this into your configuration file:

   • Replace the api_key and the allowed_chat_ids with your data.

     # Telegram Bot
     telegram_bot:
       - platform: polling
         api_key: "1117774004:EABQulCACdgkQOTN3hS_5HZwSwxDlekCixr"
         allowed_chat_ids:
           - 44441111
     

4. Create a notifier:

   • Paste this into your configuration file:

   • Replace the name and the chat_id with your data.

     # Notifier
     notify:
       - platform: telegram
         name: "sarah"
         chat_id: 44441111
     

   • Restart Home Assistant.

5. From the conversation with BotFather, select the link to open a chat with your new bot.

6. In the chat with the new bot, enter /start.

7. Test the action:

   • Go to Developer tools > Actions > YAML mode.

   • Paste this into the YAML file:

   • Replace the service and the message with your data.

     action: notify.sarah
     data:
       message: "Yay! A message from Home Assistant."
     

   • Select Perform action. You should now get a message.

8. You can do more with this. Check out the configuration descriptions and examples below.

Methods to retrieve a chat_id

Method 1: You can get your chat_id by sending any message to the GetIDs bot.

Method 2: To retrieve your chat_id you can visit https://api.telegram.org/bot<YOUR_API_TOKEN>/getUpdates or to use $ curl -X GET https://api.telegram.org/bot<YOUR_API_TOKEN>/getUpdates after you have sent the bot a message. Replace <YOUR_API_TOKEN> with your actual token.

The result set will include your chat ID as id in the chat section:

{
	"ok": true,
	"result": [{
		"update_id": 254199982,
		"message": {
			"message_id": 27,
			"from": {
				"id": 123456789,
				"first_name": "YOUR_FIRST_NAME YOUR_NICK_NAME",
				"last_name": "YOUR_LAST_NAME",
				"username": "YOUR_NICK_NAME"
			},
			"chat": {
				"id": 123456789,
				"first_name": "YOUR_FIRST_NAME YOUR_NICK_NAME",
				"last_name": "YOUR_LAST_NAME",
				"username": "YOUR_NICK_NAME",
				"type": "private"
			},
			"date": 1678292650,
			"text": "test"
		}
	}]
}

Method 3: Another way to get your chat ID directly is described below. Start your Python interpreter from the command-line:

$ python3
>>> import telegram
>>> bot = telegram.Bot(token='YOUR_API_TOKEN')
>>> chat_id = bot.getUpdates()[-1].message.chat_id
>>> print(chat_id)
123456789

Method 4: You can also get the chat ID from the Home Assistant logs. If you have set up the bot already, you can send a message to your bot from an unauthorized ID and you will see an error entry in the log containing the ID.

Configuration

To enable Telegram notifications in your installation, add the following to your configuration.yamlThe configuration.yaml file is the main configuration file for Home Assistant. It lists the integrations to be loaded and their specific configurations. In some cases, the configuration needs to be edited manually directly in the configuration.yaml file. Most integrations can be configured in the UI. [Learn more] file. After changing the configuration.yamlThe configuration.yaml file is the main configuration file for Home Assistant. It lists the integrations to be loaded and their specific configurations. In some cases, the configuration needs to be edited manually directly in the configuration.yaml file. Most integrations can be configured in the UI. [Learn more] file, restart Home Assistant to apply the changes. The integration is now shown on the integrations page under Settings > Devices & services. Its entities are listed on the integration card itself and on the Entities tab.

# Example configuration.yaml entry for the Telegram Bot
telegram_bot:
  - platform: polling
    api_key: YOUR_API_KEY
    allowed_chat_ids:
      - CHAT_ID_1 # example: 123456789 for the chat_id of a user
      - CHAT_ID_2 # example: -987654321 for the chat_id of a group
      - CHAT_ID_3

# Example configuration.yaml entry for the notifier
notify:
  - platform: telegram
    name: NOTIFIER_NAME
    chat_id: CHAT_ID_1
    
  # It is possible to add multiple notifiers by using another chat_id
  # the example belows shows an additional notifier which sends messages to the bot which is added to a group
  - platform: telegram
    name: NOTIFIER_NAME_OF_GROUP
    chat_id: CHAT_ID_2

Refer to the platforms mentioned in the Telegram chatbot page for telegram_bot configuration.

To use notifications, please see the getting started with automation page.

Text message

...
actions:
  - action: notify.NOTIFIER_NAME
    data:
      title: "*Send a message*"
      message: "That's an example that _sends_ a *formatted* message with a custom inline keyboard."
      data:
        inline_keyboard:
          - 'Task 1:/command1, Task 2:/command2'
          - 'Task 3:/command3, Task 4:/command4'

Photo support

...
actions:
  - action: notify.NOTIFIER_NAME
    data:
      title: "Send an images"
      message: "That's an example that sends an image."
      data:
        photo:
          - url: http://192.168.1.28/camera.jpg
            username: "admin"
            password: "secret"
          - file: /tmp/picture.jpg
            caption: "Picture Title xy"
          - url: http://somebla.ie/video.png
            caption: "i.e., for a Title"

configuration.yaml
...
homeassistant:
  allowlist_external_dirs:
    - /tmp
    - /home/kenji/data

Video support

...
actions:
  - action: notify.NOTIFIER_NAME
    data:
      title: "Send a video"
      message: "That's an example that sends a video."
      data:
        video:
          - url: http://192.168.1.28/camera.mp4
            username: "admin"
            password: "secret"
          - file: /tmp/video.mp4
            caption: "Video Title xy"
          - url: http://somebla.ie/video.mp4
            caption: "i.e., for a Title"

Document support

...
actions:
  - action: notify.NOTIFIER_NAME
    data:
      title: "Send a document"
      message: "That's an example that sends a document and a custom keyboard."
      data:
        document:
          file: /tmp/whatever.odf
          caption: "Document Title xy"
        keyboard:
          - '/command1, /command2'
          - '/command3, /command4'

Location support

...

actions:
  - action: notify.NOTIFIER_NAME
    data:
      title: "Send location"
      message: "Location updated."
      data:
        location:
          latitude: 32.87336
          longitude: 117.22743

Extra data attributes support

...
actions:
  - action: notify.NOTIFIER_NAME
    data:
      title: "*Send a message*"
      message: |-
        That's an example that sends a message with message_tag, disable_notification and disable_web_page_preview.
        <a href="https://www.home-assistant.io/">HA site</a>
      data:
        parse_mode: html
        message_tag: "example_tag"
        disable_notification: True
        disable_web_page_preview: True