Add paying customers to a private Telegram chat or channel automatically when they subscribe or purchase.
The Telegram entitlement gives paying customers access to a private chat or channel. The Dodo Payments Telegram bot generates a one-time invite link for each customer and removes them on cancellation.
In your Dodo Payments dashboard, go to Entitlements and click +, then choose Telegram Access as the integration. The dashboard asks for your Telegram user ID so the bot can verify ownership of the chats it manages.
New Entitlement → Telegram Access. The dashboard needs your Telegram user ID before it lists chats.
The next two steps are set-up tasks on Telegram and can be completed in either order — get your user ID and add the bot to your chat as admin. Once both are done, return to the dashboard for the final step.
2
Get your Telegram user ID
On Telegram, message /start to:
@dodo_payments_bot if you’re using Live Mode
@DodoPaymentsTestBot if you’re using Test Mode
The bot replies with your numeric Telegram user ID. Copy it — you’ll paste it into the dashboard in the last step.
3
Add the bot to your chat as an admin
In the Telegram group or channel you want to gate, open the members list and add the same bot as admin (@dodo_payments_bot for live, @DodoPaymentsTestBot for test) with these two permissions enabled:
Ban Users — required to remove members on revocation
Add Users — required to invite paying customers
Leave every other admin permission off.
Telegram → Promote to admin. Only Ban Users and Add Users need to be enabled.
4
Connect Telegram and pick the chat
Back in the dashboard, paste the user ID from step 2 into Telegram User ID and click Connect Telegram. The chat picker now lists every group and channel where the bot is an admin — pick the one you want to gate, give the entitlement a name, and click Create Entitlement.
Dodo Payments creates a pending grant and asks the bot to generate a one-time invite link to the configured chat.
Once the link is ready, the grant moves to delivered and the link is included in the delivery email and customer portal.
The customer taps the link and is added to the chat.
On revocation, the bot removes the customer from the chat.
The invite link is single-use and expires after the customer joins. If they lose the link before joining, regenerate it by re-sending the delivery email or revoking and recreating the grant from the dashboard.
The Dodo Payments bot must be added to the chat as an admin with Add Users enabled. The picker reads live state, so the chat appears as soon as the bot is an admin.
Customer says the invite link doesn't work
Telegram one-time links expire after first use. If the customer tapped it on a logged-out device or lost the link, revoke the grant and reissue.
Customer cancelled but is still in the chat
The bot needs the Ban Users admin permission to remove members. Open the chat settings and confirm both Ban Users and Add Users are checked on the Dodo Payments bot.