Build Your First Telegram Bot with Python

A Telegram bot is one of the most rewarding beginner Python projects: with a few dozen lines of code you build something that really works and that you can show your friends. This same simple path is the foundation for more serious automation tools you’ll build later.

Prerequisites

• Python installed (installation guide)
• A Telegram account

Step 1: Get a token from BotFather

In Telegram, open the official @BotFather bot and:

1. Send /newbot
2. Give it a display name (e.g. “My First Bot”)
3. Give it a username ending in bot (e.g. my_first_1234_bot)

BotFather replies with a token that looks like:

7412345678:AAHfXw3v9tK2mQ...

This token is the key to your bot — never share it and never commit it to GitHub.

Step 2: Install the library

Inside a virtual environment, install the most popular Telegram bot library:

pip install python-telegram-bot

Step 3: A bot that says hello

Create bot.py:

from telegram import Update
from telegram.ext import Application, CommandHandler, MessageHandler, filters, ContextTypes

TOKEN = "put-your-token-here"

async def start(update: Update, context: ContextTypes.DEFAULT_TYPE):
    await update.message.reply_text("Hi! I'm your first bot 🤖")

async def echo(update: Update, context: ContextTypes.DEFAULT_TYPE):
    await update.message.reply_text(f"You said: {update.message.text}")

app = Application.builder().token(TOKEN).build()
app.add_handler(CommandHandler("start", start))
app.add_handler(MessageHandler(filters.TEXT & ~filters.COMMAND, echo))

print("Bot is running...")
app.run_polling()

Run it:

python bot.py

Now find your bot in Telegram and send /start — it answers! Send any other text message and it echoes it back.

Understanding the code

• CommandHandler("start", start) — when a user sends /start, the start function runs
• MessageHandler(filters.TEXT & ~filters.COMMAND, echo) — every text message (except commands) goes to echo
• run_polling() — the bot keeps asking Telegram’s servers “any new messages?”

Step 4: A real feature

Let’s add a /dollar command that (for now) returns a fixed number:

async def dollar(update: Update, context: ContextTypes.DEFAULT_TYPE):
    await update.message.reply_text("USD today: 100,500")

app.add_handler(CommandHandler("dollar", dollar))

The natural next step? Fetching the real price from a website — which is exactly the topic of Web Scraping with Python.

Exercise

Add a /help command that lists the bot’s commands, and add a condition to echo so a special reply comes back when the user sends “hello”.