What a Telegram mini app is, and how it differs from a bot

What a person sees

You open a chat with a coffee shop’s bot. Down by the input line, instead of a list of commands, there is a button — Open, say. Tapping it raises a window over the conversation: a menu with photographs, a cart, the time to have the order ready. Send it and the window closes; you are back in the chat.

Underneath it is an ordinary web page, except the messenger opens it itself, in its built-in browser, and hands it signed data about who opened it. The signature is checked with the owner’s bot token, so the app knows the person without a login or a password. Colours can follow the messenger too: those the author left unset, or set as a light and dark pair, switch along with the person’s theme.

Telegram opened this to bots in 2022 under the name Web Apps, which is why developer documentation still says “web app”. The Russian messenger MAX works the same way: a mini app opens from a bot.

How a mini app differs from a bot

A bot talks in messages: a command, a reply, a row of buttons under it. For a short scenario that is enough — opening hours, a link, two questions answered. Choosing among thirty products with photographs, filters and a cart inside a conversation is another matter: the chat turns into a feed of dozens of messages, and getting back to the third product means scrolling.

A mini app is screens. People scroll them, move between them and go back, as in any app on a phone. A form is a form with fields, not a chain of “enter your name”, “now your phone”.

They are not rivals. Inside a messenger a mini app needs a bot: it opens from the bot’s menu, the visitor is identified by the bot’s signature, and submissions reach the owner through it. So the real question is rarely “a bot or an app” but “is a bot alone enough”.

How it differs from a website

A website opens in a browser; people have to leave the messenger for it, and to order they register or type in a phone number. A mini app lives where people already talk: they do not leave the chat, do not set a password, and forward the app to a friend as an ordinary message.

The flip side: an app that opens only inside a messenger is invisible to search. In our builder the “Works as a site” switch deals with that: the same screens open in a browser too, each with its own address, title and description, plus a sitemap. In a browser a visitor signs in with a code confirmed inside the same app in Telegram or MAX.

Where mini apps help

The successful cases share one trait: a person picks from a list and sends something — an order, a booking, an application, a request. A store with a catalogue, a cart and card payment. Booking a specialist, a doctor or a car service. A restaurant menu with delivery and pre-ordering at a coffee shop. An events listing with tickets, a fitness timetable, an online course, vacancies with applications, a guest card with points.

Where a mini app will not help is where you need to write to people yourself. The visitor opens the app; writing first to everyone who has opened it is not possible in our builder — there are no broadcasts to visitors. Announcements stay in your channel, and pinning the app link there works well.

How to make your own

This used to mean a developer, a server, a domain and a certificate. In the builder the order is shorter: create a bot with @BotFather, take a template from a similar trade, swap in your own text, prices and photographs, and press Publish. The platform sets the menu button itself with your token; HTTPS and hosting are on our side.

Building and previewing is free with no time limit. After the first publish there are three days of trial, then a plan from 1,290 ₽ a month, which can also be paid in Telegram Stars. The process is walked through step by step in the separate guide on creating a mini app.

Templates from this guide

• 🛍️Online storeSix screens are enough to sell: home, product, cart, my orders, favourites and profile. They are already wired together — buttons lead where they should, the cart adds up, and a placed order arrives in your Telegram.
• 💅AppointmentsClients book themselves, at night and at weekends, without getting through to the front desk. The booking reaches your Telegram at once, and the client sees it in the app.
• 🍽️Food deliveryA guest opens the menu from your bot menu button — nothing to install, nothing to register. They add dishes to the cart, give an address and pay; the order arrives in your Telegram as it is sent.
• 🎫Events and ticketsA listing you can buy a ticket from straight away. A person picks the event, the seat category and the number of tickets and pays, and the purchase reaches your Telegram. The ticket screen with a QR code is a design sample.

Other questions

What is a Telegram mini app, in plain words?

It is a set of screens that opens right inside Telegram, over a chat with a bot: a catalogue, a booking form, a menu, a timetable. Nothing is installed and nobody signs up — the messenger itself tells the app who opened it.

Are a mini app and a web app the same thing?

Yes. “Web App” is the name from Telegram’s Bot API, “mini app” the one from the messenger’s interface. Both mean a web page the messenger opens inside itself, from a bot.

How does a mini app differ from a bot?

A bot talks in messages and the buttons under them; a mini app shows screens people scroll and move between. Inside a messenger they work together: the app opens from the bot’s menu, and its submissions reach the owner through the bot. With “Works as a site” the same screens also open in a browser, where no bot is needed.

Does anything have to be downloaded to open a mini app?

No. It opens inside Telegram or MAX — on a phone or a computer — from the bot’s menu button or by a link. It has no separate listing in an app store.

How much does it cost to make a mini app?

In our builder, assembling is free with no time limit. Publishing gets three days of trial from the first publish, then a plan from 1,290 ₽ a month or from 1,000 Telegram Stars. No server, domain or developer is needed.