How to Accept Telegram Stars Payments: Step-by-Step Guide for Creators and Merchants

Who can accept Telegram Stars?

Anyone with a Telegram account can receive Stars. You do not need a company, a merchant account or a bank integration. Stars are designed for digital goods and services: subscriptions, courses, software, premium content, memberships, consulting, in-app items and tips. If you sell physical products you can still use Stars, but keep in mind that payouts arrive in TON rather than in your bank account.

There are three practical ways to accept Stars, from the simplest to the most flexible.

Option 1: Accept Stars with a payment link (no code)

A payment link is a URL that opens a ready-to-pay Stars invoice in Telegram. You create it once, share it anywhere (channel post, bio, website, DM) and every payment lands in your balance. This is what Telegram Stars Payment Platform provides.

1. Create a free account. You log in with Telegram, there is no credit card and no monthly fee.
2. Open Invoices → New in the dashboard. Enter a title (for example "Premium Access"), a short description, and the amount in Stars.
3. Click Create. You get a payment link that you can copy, plus an optional short redirect link (telegram-stars.io/r/your-slug) with click tracking.
4. Share the link. Your customer taps it, sees the native Telegram payment sheet, and confirms with their Stars balance (or buys Stars on the spot).
5. The payment is credited to your balance instantly, with a full ledger entry. After the 21-day holding period you can withdraw to any TON wallet.

For a deeper look at links, redirects and tracking, read Telegram Stars payment links explained.

Option 2: Accept Stars through your own Telegram bot

If you already run a bot, you can sell directly from it. In the Bot API, Stars are a regular payment currency with the code XTR, except that you do not need a payment provider token.

1. Call sendInvoice (sends the invoice as a message) or createInvoiceLink (returns a shareable URL) with currency="XTR", an empty provider_token, and a single price item whose amount is the number of Stars.
2. When the user confirms, Telegram sends your bot a pre_checkout_query. Answer it with answerPreCheckoutQuery(ok=true) within 10 seconds, or the payment fails.
3. Telegram then sends a message containing successful_payment, with the telegram_payment_charge_id. Store it: you need it for refunds and reconciliation.
4. Deliver the product (unlock the feature, send the file, add the user to a group).

This gives you full control but also full responsibility: hosting the bot, handling retries, building a ledger, and managing withdrawals on Fragment. We cover the implementation in detail in Telegram Stars Bot API guide.

Option 3: Accept Stars in a Mini App

Telegram Mini Apps (web apps that run inside Telegram) can trigger Stars payments too. Your backend creates an invoice link with createInvoiceLink, and the Mini App opens it with WebApp.openInvoice(url, callback). The payment sheet appears over your app and the callback tells you whether the user paid. This is how most Telegram games sell in-game items.

Which option should you choose?

Fees when accepting Telegram Stars

Telegram itself does not charge sellers a per-transaction fee for receiving Stars. The costs sit elsewhere: the buyer pays a store commission when purchasing Stars, and the seller realises a conversion rate when turning Stars into TON. If you use a payment platform, add its fee. Telegram Stars Payment Platform charges a flat 3% with no setup or monthly fees. See Telegram Stars fees explained for a worked example.

The 21-day holding period

Stars you receive are not withdrawable immediately. Telegram applies a 21-day hold to cover refunds and disputes. Telegram Stars Payment Platform mirrors this rule and shows you a "maturing" balance with the exact date each payment becomes available, so you always know what you can withdraw. Details in Refunds, the 21-day hold and payout rules.

Best practices to sell more with Stars

• Price in round Stars amounts (50, 100, 250, 500). They map neatly to the Stars packs users buy.
• Explain what the buyer gets in the invoice description. The payment sheet shows it and it reduces refund requests.
• Pin your payment link in your channel or group and put it in your bio.
• Offer a subscription for recurring content instead of one-off posts; Stars subscriptions renew automatically.
• Use short redirect links for tracking campaigns, so you know which post or ad generated the sale.
• Deliver instantly. Stars buyers expect the same immediacy as an in-app purchase.

Getting your first Stars payment today

If you want to be live in the next ten minutes: sign in with Telegram, create an invoice link for your best-selling product, post it to your audience, and watch the balance update in real time. There is nothing to install and the 3% fee only applies when you actually get paid.