Telegram Business explained: the features, how it relates to Premium, and how to set it up

Telegram Business is a section in the settings of an ordinary Telegram account, not a separate app and not a separate sign-up. It adds business hours and a location to your profile, a greeting for new customers, an away message, quick replies, links to chat with a click counter, and a way to connect a bot. Telegram launched it on 31 March 2024 and has bundled it with Premium ever since. In the app it lives under Settings > Telegram Business.

As of 28 September 2026, only one part of it works without Premium: a bot that replies on your behalf. That changed on 7 May 2026. Everything else still needs the subscription. Telegram’s developer documentation says so plainly: all Telegram Business features are available to Premium subscribers, and connected bots are also available to non-Premium users.

Telegram Business vs Premium: what is the difference

People ask whether they should get Premium or Telegram Business. There is nothing to choose between: the business features are part of Premium. Subscribers get them along with everything else, such as 4 GB uploads, voice-to-text, no ads and more (Premium FAQ). You cannot buy “just Business”.

The app itself carries one caveat. On Android, the section header reads: “The benefits of Telegram Business are temporarily included with Telegram Premium” (Telegram language pack). The launch post also said “for the moment”. So Business may become a separate subscription at some point. Telegram has not named a date.

We do not quote a price for Premium, because it depends on your country and how you pay, and it changes. According to Telegram’s FAQ, subscribing through @PremiumBot is cheaper than through the App Store or Google Play, since app store fees do not apply, and a yearly plan costs less than paying monthly. Paying through @PremiumBot works in the versions of Telegram downloaded from telegram.org: Android, Desktop and macOS. Settings > Telegram Premium shows today’s price for your account.

What needs a subscription and what does not:

What each feature does

The menu names below are from the English Android app as of 28 September 2026. On iPhone and desktop the wording can differ.

Business Hours. A weekly schedule with a time zone. Customers see on your profile whether you are open right now, and can switch the hours to their own time. Shifts that cross midnight work too, for example 18:00 to 02:00 the next day. The away message’s “Outside of Business Hours” mode depends on these hours, so fill them in first.

Location. An address of up to 96 characters and, if you like, a pin on the map (API). Customers can copy the address from your profile.

Start Page. A title, a short text and a sticker that people see in an empty chat with you before they send their first message. If you leave it blank, Telegram shows a random greeting and sticker. Space is tight: according to the API documentation, 32 characters for the title and 70 for the text. That is room for one idea, such as your hours or what to send first.

Greeting Message. A message sent automatically when someone writes to you for the first time. Under “Period of no activity” you pick 7, 14, 21 or 28 days (API). If more time than that has passed since your last conversation, the greeting goes out again when the customer writes. A greeting can hold several messages, photos, a file or a link, such as a price list in PDF.

Away Message. An automatic reply for when you cannot answer. There are three modes: “Send Always”, “Outside of Business Hours” and “Custom Schedule”, for example for a holiday. The “Only if Offline” toggle stops the reply from going out if you were online in the last 10 minutes (API).

For both the greeting and the away message you choose recipients: new or existing chats, contacts or non-contacts, plus a list of exclusions. That way your spouse, your accountant and your supplier do not get the auto-reply. Both work in private chats only.

Quick Replies. Saved messages you call up with “/”: type “/” in the message field, pick a shortcut, and it is sent. One shortcut can hold up to 20 messages with text, links, photos and files, and you can create up to 100 shortcuts (default values from the same API documentation). Quick replies do not work in groups, only in private chats. And you send them yourself, by hand.

Links to Chat. A link that opens a chat with you with your text already typed in the customer’s message field, for example “I’d like to book for Friday”. Every link has a click counter and can be turned into a QR code. Make one link per source, such as your Instagram bio, your website and a sticker by the till, and in a month you will see where people come from. You can have up to 100 active links (again, the default value in the API documentation).

Without Premium, a plain link to your username of the form t.me/username?text=… does something similar: its text is also put into the message field (links documentation). It has no counter, though.

Folder tags. A coloured label with the folder name next to each chat in your chat list. Create folders such as “New”, “Awaiting payment” and “Regulars”, and you can see a customer’s status without opening the chat. Folders are free for everyone; coloured tags need Premium.

Chat Automation. A bot that replies on your behalf. Since 7 May 2026 it connects without Premium: Settings > Chat Automation. The details are in our article on the auto-reply bot.

The section also includes an emoji status next to your name and posts on your profile, where you can show products or your work.

How to set it up in eight steps

1. Subscribe to Premium on the account you use to talk to customers. A subscription covers one account: if customers are answered from two, you need two.
2. Open Settings > Telegram Business.
3. Fill in “Business Hours” with your time zone, and “Location”. Without hours, the “Outside of Business Hours” mode will not work.
4. Turn on “Greeting Message”. Under recipients, exclude your contacts: family, staff, suppliers. Pick the “Period of no activity” by how often customers come back. For a shop, 7 to 14 days is enough; for a clinic people visit twice a year, 28 fits better.
5. Turn on “Away Message” in “Outside of Business Hours” mode and enable “Only if Offline”, so the auto-reply does not interrupt you when you are around in the evening.
6. Create 5 to 7 quick replies for questions you get every day: price, address, payment, delivery, booking. Keep the shortcuts short, such as /price, /address, /pay.
7. Create links to chat, one per customer source, and note which one is used where.
8. Test it from another account. Ask someone who is not in your contacts to message you during the day and in the evening. While you are at it, open Settings > Privacy and Security > Messages: “Who can send me messages?” should be set to “Everybody”. Premium lets you restrict messages from strangers or charge Stars for them, and for a business that shuts out new customers.

A Telegram Business account is your ordinary account

There is no separate account type. “Creating a Telegram Business account” means turning on the section’s features in the account you already use with customers. This is where Telegram differs from WhatsApp, which has a separate WhatsApp Business app.

If you want to keep personal and work chats apart, create a second account on another number. Telegram supports several accounts in one app for free, and then only the work account needs Premium. The section applies to an account, not to a channel or group: auto-replies and quick replies work in private chats only.

Where the built-in features stop

These features save time, but they do not hold a conversation. Their limits follow from how they are built.

• One text for everyone. The greeting and the away message do not read what the customer wrote. Someone asking the price of a sofa gets the same text as someone asking about delivery.
• They run on a schedule, not on a question. The greeting goes out on the first message or after a gap, the away message on a schedule. A second, specific question gets no automatic answer.
• Voice messages go unanswered. Premium has voice-to-text, but that is for you. The auto-reply does not look at what a message says, whether typed or spoken.
• A person sends quick replies. At night there is no one to send them.
• No customer memory. Folder tags are all the “CRM” you get. Who has bought before, who is waiting for an invoice, who went quiet after hearing the price: you keep that in your head or in a spreadsheet. Telegram added private notes for contacts in October 2025, but only for people you have saved as contacts.

There is one more reason not to count a greeting as a reply. In How long a lead lives we looked at a peer-reviewed 2026 study, which we know from the university’s press release. It is about hiring freelancers rather than sales, but the finding carries over: a fast reply lost its advantage when the recipient believed it came from an automated system or AI. A “thanks, we’ll get back to you soon” template doesn’t hold on to a lead by itself. A bot is automated too.

Its value lies elsewhere: of the automated tools, only a bot answers on substance straight away (quotes a price from the list, books a time slot, makes sense of a voice message) and hands anything unusual to a person quickly. Since May 2026 you can connect one without Premium. A bot that knows your catalogue and hands hot customers to a manager is a development project, described on our business chatbots page.

Ready-to-use greeting and away messages

The rules are simple. One idea per message. Say when a person will reply. Ask for what you need to get started: size, car model, a convenient day. Replace the square brackets with your details. Each template comes in English and in Uzbek (Latin script); Russian versions are in the Russian edition of this article.

Online shop on Telegram

• Greeting. Hi! This is [name]. Tell us what you’re looking for and your size, and we’ll send photos and the price. Delivery in Tashkent takes [time], across Uzbekistan [time].
• Salomlashuv xabari. Assalomu alaykum! Bu — [nom]. Nima qidirayotganingiz va oʻlchamingizni yozing — rasm va narxini yuboramiz. Toshkent boʻylab yetkazib berish — [muddat], Oʻzbekiston boʻylab — [muddat].
• Away message. Thanks for your message! We’re open from [10:00] to [20:00] and will reply in the morning. If you’ve already picked something, send us a screenshot and we’ll process your order first.
• “Joyida emas”. Xabaringiz uchun rahmat! Biz soat [10:00] dan [20:00] gacha ishlaymiz, ertalab javob beramiz. Mahsulotni tanlagan boʻlsangiz, skrinshot yuboring — ertalab buyurtmangizni birinchi boʻlib rasmiylashtiramiz.

Clinic

• Greeting. Hello! This is [name] clinic, [address]. To book, tell us the service or doctor and a day that suits you, and our front desk will offer a time. If you are in severe pain, call [phone].
• Salomlashuv xabari. Assalomu alaykum! [nom] klinikasi, [manzil]. Qabulga yozilish uchun xizmat yoki shifokorni va qulay kunni yozing — administrator vaqt taklif qiladi. Ogʻriq kuchli boʻlsa, qoʻngʻiroq qiling: [telefon].
• Away message. Our front desk is closed right now; we work from [8:00] to [18:00]. Leave your name, the service and a convenient time, and we’ll confirm your appointment in the morning. If you are in severe pain, call [phone].
• “Joyida emas”. Qabulxona hozir yopiq, biz soat [8:00] dan [18:00] gacha ishlaymiz. Ismingiz, xizmat va qulay vaqtni yozib qoldiring — ertalab qabulni tasdiqlaymiz. Ogʻriq kuchli boʻlsa, qoʻngʻiroq qiling: [telefon].

Repair service: cars, electronics

• Greeting. Hello! This is [name] service. Send us the make, the year and what happened; photos or video help. A technician will reply with a rough price and timing.
• Salomlashuv xabari. Assalomu alaykum! [nom] servisi. Mashina markasi, yili va nima boʻlganini yozing, rasm yoki video ham yuborishingiz mumkin. Usta javob berib, taxminiy narx va muddatni aytadi.
• Away message. Our technicians are away right now; we work from [9:00] to [19:00]. Describe the problem and we’ll get back to you first thing in the morning. If you need a tow truck, call [phone].
• “Joyida emas”. Usta hozir aloqada emas, biz soat [9:00] dan [19:00] gacha ishlaymiz. Muammoni yozib qoldiring — ertalab birinchi navbatda javob beramiz. Evakuator kerak boʻlsa, qoʻngʻiroq qiling: [telefon].

For the Start Page, one line of up to 70 characters is enough: “Tell us what you need and we’ll send photos and prices” or “Nima qidirayotganingizni yozing — rasm va narx yuboramiz”.

What we don’t know

We checked the menu names against Telegram’s Russian, Uzbek and English language packs for Android as of 28 September 2026. On iPhone and Telegram Desktop they may differ. We do not give a Premium price for Uzbekistan: it depends on the store and payment method, and we could not open the Uzbek App Store listing without a phone.

Telegram’s FAQ does not say what happens to your business hours, greeting and quick replies when Premium runs out, and we have not tested it ourselves. The limits of 100 links, 20 messages per quick reply, and 32 and 70 characters on the start page are default values from the API documentation; the real ones may differ. We found no reliable statistics on how many businesses in Uzbekistan use Telegram Business.

Where we stand, honestly

We build Valli, an AI auto-responder for Telegram Business, which is currently in pilot. Valli connects to an account as a bot and does what the built-in auto-replies cannot. It answers from the profile and catalogue the owner has filled in, transcribes customers’ voice messages, and when the profile has no answer it says it will check with the owner. If the owner replies in a chat themselves, Valli stays silent there for two hours. We have not yet tested Valli on an account without Premium, so its website still says Premium is required.

We have no numbers. We have not yet measured how many inquiries a greeting saves or how many a bot adds. So our advice is to turn on the built-in features from this article in any case, before any bot. They come with Premium at no extra cost and cover nights and weekends with at least a promise of a reply.

If you want to see where your business loses customers in chat, start by reviewing one process; that is how our sales automation work begins. Describe the process in the questionnaire on our home page or message us on Telegram. The review takes 48 hours and is free.