Where Telegram Ads Appear in 2026: Channels, Search, Bots, Video and Banner in Bot#

When Telegram Ads launched, there was one place an ad could appear: a "Sponsored" message at the bottom of a large public channel. By 2026 the same platform sells placements in global search, inside bots, over channel videos and — most recently — as a banner inside bots targeted by audience data. Each surface has its own rules, prices and buying route.

This is the map, with sources for every date and limit.

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The surfaces at a glance#

Surface	Since	Where the ad shows	How to buy
Channels	2021	Below the posts of public channels with 1,000+ subscribers; since December 2024 also between posts	All cabinets
Media formats (image, video)	Sept 2024 for agencies	In the channel ad itself	Resellers, with a CPM mark-up
Global search	April 2025	Above search results, for chosen keywords	Euro, Gram and Stars cabinets
Bots	Crypto and Stars cabinets first; euro and ruble cabinets since May 2025	Above the chat with a bot, like an action bar	All cabinets
Video player	July 2025	Over channel videos in full-screen mode	Agencies only
Banner in Bot	Sept 2026	Inside bots, shown to a selected audience	Via Telegram Ads cabinets; MTS AdTech announced it

Sources: Telegram API: sponsored messages, ads.telegram.org, tginfo on media formats, between posts, search, bots, video; AdIndex on Banner in Bot.

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1. Channels: still the core#

The classic format: a short text (up to 160 characters) with a button, labelled "Sponsored", shown after the user scrolls past the latest posts of a public channel with at least 1,000 subscribers (getting-started, guidelines). Since 17 December 2024 ads can also appear between posts. The API adds a posts_between field that controls how far apart they are, and a recommended flag that labels an ad "Recommended" instead of "Sponsored" (API).

Channel owners receive 50% of the revenue from these ads (Telegram API).

2. Media formats#

Images and video in channel ads were opened to agencies on 2 September 2024 with a minimum of €20,000 per month per format (tginfo). Today resellers sell them with a CPM mark-up: eLama lists +80% for an image and +100% for video or GIF (eLama).

3. Global search#

Launched in April 2025. An advertiser picks up to 10 keywords of 4–32 characters, and a channel or bot is shown above the results when someone searches for them; websites cannot be promoted this way (ppc.world). In the API these are "sponsored peers" (API). Two rules to know:

• Search ads bought with TON/Gram are not shown to users in Russia, Ukraine, Israel and Palestine; bought with Stars, they are shown to everyone (tginfo).
• Since the 2026 rewrite of the ad policies, keywords "must not exploit harmful, prohibited or sensitive topics" (§4.8, guidelines).

For Russian accounts, resellers quote a minimum CPM of €0.75 for targeting channels, bots and search since 28 August 2026 (eLama).

4. Bots#

Ads in bots were first sold for TON and Stars; since May 2025 they can also be bought in euro and ruble cabinets. At that point OneSpot described the terms as: bots with more than 1,000 users a day, up to nine bots or topics per campaign, CPM from €1, no geo targeting (tginfo). The ad appears above the chat, like an action bar (API). Bot owners get the same 50% revenue share as channels.

5. The video player#

Since July 2025 a text ad of up to 160 characters can appear over channel videos watched full-screen. It shows up after 5 seconds, can be closed after 9, disappears after 30, and the next one cannot appear sooner than 2 minutes later. It runs only in channel videos and is sold only through agencies (tginfo).

6. Banner in Bot#

The newest surface. On 15 September 2026 MTS AdTech told AdIndex about Banner in Bot: an ad inside Telegram bots shown to a chosen audience — by socio-demographics, channel subscriptions, MTS Big Data segments or the advertiser's own phone base. The creative is text, a logo and a custom emoji, without photos or video. According to MTS, it is available in Telegram Ads cabinets, with MTS's own ad tools to follow (AdIndex). Telegram itself has not published an announcement.

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What changed in targeting#

Banner in Bot is a sign of a broader shift. The ads.telegram.org landing used to say ads did not rely on personal data and were determined by channels. Since August 2026 it says only that Telegram does not use "the contents of your private chats or contacts lists for ad targeting" (ads.telegram.org). Euro cabinets sold by resellers now offer geo, language and interest targeting, and some resellers add mobile-operator data — for example, eLama opened a cabinet with MegaFon data in August 2026 (eLama).

For anyone reading ad data this matters: an ad seen in a channel is no longer proof that the advertiser targeted that channel's audience.

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Where advertisers send traffic: our data#

We can't see every surface — our archive is built from sponsored messages in the channels we track. But we can see where those ads lead. As of 23 September 2026, of 585,770 creatives in the archive:

Destination of the ad button	Creatives	Share
A Telegram channel	396,421	67.7%
A bot	120,923	20.6%
A personal account	43,827	7.5%
An external website	24,515	4.2%
A mini app (subset of bots)	6,281	1.1%

Source: tgadsspy.com API, dir= filter, 23.09.2026. Categories can overlap (mini apps are bots), so shares do not add up to exactly 100%.

Two things stand out. One ad in five sends people to a bot: bots are now both a destination and, since 2025, a place where ads are shown. And 7.5% of creatives lead to personal accounts: Telegram's ad policies now list "accounts" next to channels and bots as things that can be promoted (guidelines).

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Which surface for which job#

• Grow a channel → channel ads (self-serve Gram cabinet with a list of channels, or a reseller for audience targeting) and search keywords that match your topic.
• Get users into a bot or mini app → search keywords plus ads in bots.
• Reach a demographic segment → euro cabinet via a reseller; Banner in Bot where available.
• Brand video → the video player through an agency.
• A native post in a specific channel → not Telegram Ads at all: see Suggested Posts.

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FAQ#

Can I buy search ads without a reseller? Yes — the self-serve Gram cabinet and the Stars cabinet also sell search placements, but TON/Gram-bought search ads are not shown in Russia, Ukraine, Israel and Palestine.

Do ads in bots let me target a country? At launch, no geo targeting was available for bot placements, per OneSpot. Banner in Bot is audience-targeted, per MTS.

Can Premium users see these ads? Premium users can hide ads; channel owners at a high enough boost level can switch ads off for everyone (API).

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Sources: Telegram API: sponsored messages, revenue, ads.telegram.org, getting-started, guidelines, tginfo, ppc.world, eLama, AdIndex. Data: tgadsspy.com · License: CC BY 4.0

Telegram Ads Spy Research (2026). Where Telegram Ads Appear in 2026: Channels, Search, Bots, Video and Banner in Bot. tgadsspy.com. Retrieved from https://tgadsspy.com/blog/telegram-ad-surfaces-2026