How to Run a Telegram Bot on a Server

Use hosting when the bot needs to keep working after you close your laptop. For real users, reliability matters more than raw CPU power.

Run the bot where it can stay online

During development, you can run the bot on your computer. For real users, the bot should run on a server with stable power and internet connection. Bot programs are usually lightweight, so a small VPS or container is enough for many projects.

Check reliability before CPU power:

• The process should restart after crashes and server reboots.
• Bot tokens and API keys should be stored outside the source code.
• Logs should be available when users report bugs.
• Data should be stored in a database, not only in memory.
• Backups should exist before the bot becomes important.

For a small Linux server, systemd is often enough to keep the process running. Docker is useful when you want the same environment locally and on the server.

Use free hosting for experiments

If you can't pay for hosting yet, try these free options:

• PythonAnywhere (may be unstable)
• Yandex Cloud Functions (serverless)

Free hosting is fine for experiments. For a bot that people rely on, paid hosting is usually cheaper than debugging random sleep modes or network limits.

Choose long-polling or webhooks

When using Bot API, you can choose between long-polling and webhooks.

With long-polling (the default), your program regularly asks Telegram servers for new updates. With webhooks, Telegram sends HTTP requests to your program when updates arrive.

Long-polling is easier for development and small bots. Webhooks are better for production bots with higher message volume or strict response time requirements.

To set up webhooks, you need a web application that can receive HTTP requests. For aiogram, there are built-in features that work with aiohttp and other async frameworks. Your webhook server also needs an HTTPS/SSL certificate.

See the guide on aiogram webhooks

Persist data from updates

As discussed on the updates page, Telegram will not give your bot a complete history of users, chats, and messages on demand. If your bot needs this information, save it when updates arrive.

Common things to store:

• Users who started the bot.
• Chats where the bot was added.
• Message IDs that the bot may need to edit or delete later.
• User settings, language, and current dialog state.
• Jobs for delayed or repeated messages.

If your bot broadcasts messages, use a queue. Sending everything at once will hit Telegram limits and make failures difficult to retry.