Telegram paid subscription: how paid channels work
Telegram’s Star subscriptions let a channel charge up to 10,000 Stars a month, about $130 at the payout rate, for an invite link. In October 2026, 4.4% of 86,682 active public channels promoted paid access: a subscription bot such as Tribute or a private “VIP” channel.
How to create a paid Telegram channel
- Make the channel private. Channel Settings → Channel Type → Private.
- Create a paid invite link. Manage Invite Links → Create a New Link → Require Monthly Fee, then set the price in Stars.
- Promote the link from a free public channel, the model most paid channels in our data follow.
- Track renewals in the channel’s Stars balance; earned Stars can be withdrawn from 1,000 after a hold of up to 21 days.
Third-party bots offer the same with card payments and other currencies; @tribute is the subscription bot linked from the most channels in our snapshot. A bot takes its own fee and keeps payment data outside Telegram.
Telegram paid channel: what public channels link to
| Signal | All channels | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Link to a subscription bot | 0.7% | Tribute, InviteMember and similar payment bots |
| Private invite link plus a VIP mention | 3.8% | A free channel advertising a closed one |
| Any private invite link | 28.7% | Also used for cross-promotion and backups, not only paid access |
| Post mentions a private or paid channel | 3.2% | Words such as “VIP channel”, “закрытый канал”, “paid group” |
| Description mentions VIP or paid access | 0.6% | Offer stated in the channel profile |
| Bot | Channels | Posts |
|---|---|---|
| @tribute | 474 | 4,703 |
Telegram VIP channels by topic
| Topic | Channels | Paid access signal | Star reactions |
|---|---|---|---|
| Betting | 1,625 | 12.7% | 15.1% |
| Adult | 2,287 | 12% | 20.5% |
| Crypto | 3,505 | 11.9% | 40.2% |
| Films and series | 1,412 | 10% | 18.1% |
| AI | 396 | 6.1% | 52.3% |
| Anime | 673 | 5.9% | 41% |
| Entertainment | 628 | 5.9% | 38.9% |
| Psychology | 565 | 5.8% | 37.3% |
| Games | 2,624 | 5.6% | 53.5% |
| Events and local | 1,365 | 5.6% | 21.2% |
Paid access is most common in betting channels (12.7%). Topics where a reader expects an edge, such as trading or betting tips, sell access; topics built on an author’s personality earn tips instead.
Paid Telegram channels by size and language
| Subscribers | Channels | Paid access | Private invite links | VIP mentions |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Under 10K | 3,305 | 4.4% | 27.7% | 11.8% |
| 10K–50K | 64,856 | 4% | 27.5% | 8.6% |
| 50K–100K | 10,296 | 6% | 32.9% | 12.5% |
| 100K–500K | 7,340 | 6% | 33.9% | 13.3% |
| 500K–1M | 513 | 6.6% | 33.5% | 15.6% |
| 1M+ | 372 | 6.7% | 32.8% | 18.3% |
| Language | Channels | Paid access | Private invite links | Mentions a paid channel |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Russian | 33,351 | 4% | 32.2% | 5.1% |
| English | 9,522 | 5.3% | 22.1% | 6% |
| Persian | 9,486 | 3.9% | 28.5% | 0.1% |
| Arabic | 7,482 | 1.1% | 16.9% | 0.1% |
| Chinese | 3,444 | 13.1% | 34% | 0% |
| Uzbek | 2,894 | 1.9% | 38.4% | 0.2% |
| Ukrainian | 2,076 | 1.9% | 37.9% | 0.8% |
| Spanish | 1,471 | 6.6% | 18.5% | 1.2% |
| Burmese | 1,106 | 12.9% | 55.1% | 3.6% |
| French | 682 | 14.1% | 38% | 0.1% |
| Amharic | 675 | 2.5% | 25.5% | 0.3% |
| Italian | 630 | 0.6% | 19.7% | 0% |
| German | 539 | 2.2% | 18% | 0% |
| Hindi | 531 | 1.3% | 20.9% | 1.7% |
| Portuguese | 499 | 3.8% | 21.8% | 0% |
| Indonesian | 399 | 10.3% | 22.8% | 1.3% |
| Turkish | 361 | 2.2% | 9.7% | 0.3% |
Telegram paid posts and paid media
Paid photos and videos, launched in June 2024, unlock for up to 25,000 Stars. The public web version of a channel does not show their content, so we cannot count them. For one-off products, paid posts avoid the churn of monthly subscriptions; for ongoing content, Star subscriptions renew automatically. See also how to sell on Telegram.
Sources: Telegram blog “Super Channels, Star Reactions and Subscriptions”, August 14, 2024; Telegram client configuration reference (core.telegram.org/api/config): stars_usd_withdraw_rate_x1000 = 1300, stars_usd_sell_rate_x1000 = 1410 and the Star limits; Telegram “The Evolution of Telegram” update timeline.
Related guides
Frequently asked questions
How do I create a paid channel on Telegram?
Make the channel private, then open Channel Settings → Channel Type → Manage Invite Links → Create a New Link and turn on “Require Monthly Fee”. Set the price in Stars; subscribers who join through that link pay every month.
How much can I charge for a Telegram subscription?
Up to 10,000 Stars a month per Star subscription in Telegram’s current configuration. The channel withdraws $0.013 per Star from 1,000 Stars.
Are Telegram VIP channels worth it?
It depends on what is sold. VIP channels are common in trading signals, betting tips and adult content, where results cannot be checked in advance. Check the seller’s public channel for age, deleted posts and real engagement before paying.
Can I sell paid posts instead of a subscription?
Yes. A channel can post photos and videos that unlock for a price of up to 25,000 Stars, without making the whole channel private.
Find channels to compare
The tables above are a fixed snapshot. To look at live channels, continue in semantic channel search: try telegram vip channel, paid telegram channel or private telegram channel subscription. Before paying for a placement, check a channel’s real audience with the channel audit and its sellers with the network checker.
Sources and method
We read the last 100 public posts of 107,721 Telegram channels with at least 1,000 subscribers, collected from the web version of each channel between October 26, 2026 and October 28, 2026. 86,682 of them posted within 30 days of collection and form the base of every share on this page. The window covers 9,008,552 posts; for the median channel it spans 54 days. Channels with fewer than 20 posts are left out.
Star reactions are the paid reactions shown under each post: the counter is the number of Stars readers sent, and Telegram credits those Stars to the channel. Dollar values use the creator payout rate of $0.013 per Star; they are estimates of the Stars’ payout value, not of anyone’s bank balance. Links are classified by domain and by Telegram link type (bots, mini apps, invite links, gift and boost links). Ad markers are text labels such as erid, #ad or #реклама; unlabelled ads are not counted. Topic and language are neural-network labels from our channel index; channel creation periods come from the numeric channel ID and are intervals, not dates.
Telegram rules and prices were checked on October 28, 2026: Telegram client configuration reference (core.telegram.org/api/config): stars_usd_withdraw_rate_x1000 = 1300, stars_usd_sell_rate_x1000 = 1410 and the Star limits; Telegram Content Creator Rewards terms (telegram.org/tos/content-creator-rewards); Telegram Terms of Service for Bot Developers (telegram.org/tos/bot-developers), section 6.2. We measure what public posts show. Private channels, deleted posts, Telegram’s own ad revenue, paid media inside unopened posts and private deals are not visible to us. All numbers are baked into this page from one snapshot; nothing is fetched when you open it.