mcp-telegram
An MCP (Model Context Protocol) server that provides read-only access to the Telegram API (via MTProto/Telethon), exposing tools for listing dialogs (chats/channels/groups) and fetching unread messages from a given dialog.
Score Breakdown
⚙ Agent Friendliness
🔒 Security
Uses Telegram MTProto authentication (API ID/hash + user sign-in code). README advises not to post the API hash. However, the excerpt provides limited details about local session storage, secret persistence/rotation, audit logs, and how tool outputs might be handled. No MCP-level fine-grained scope model is documented; access effectively maps to the user's Telegram data access.
⚡ Reliability
Best When
You want an AI assistant to read and summarize unread Telegram messages from your own account, and you control the runtime environment where the MCP server stores/authenticates with Telegram.
Avoid When
You need full Telegram functionality (read/unread state changes, message history search, media downloads) or you require clearly documented operational guarantees (rate limits, retries/idempotency semantics, and security posture).
Use Cases
- • Summarizing unread Telegram messages for an AI assistant
- • Reviewing message context from specific chats/channels/groups
- • Building workflows that periodically scan unread messages and generate digests
Not For
- • Writing/modifying Telegram data (e.g., marking chats as read, drafting/sending messages)
- • Downloading media files (not implemented as of README)
- • Retrieving historical messages by date/time (not implemented as of README)
- • Compliance-sensitive deployments that require strong assurances about data handling and retention (README provides limited details)
Interface
Authentication
Auth is tied to Telegram user session/MTProto access rather than app-bot permissions. README warns that API hash is secret and should not be posted. No fine-grained permission/scopes concept is documented at the MCP layer.
Pricing
No pricing information is provided; this appears to be an open-source tool where costs are primarily your Telegram API/usage and hosting/runtime.
Agent Metadata
Known Gotchas
- ⚠ MCP server connectivity failures may occur if Claude Desktop is misconfigured (including uv binary path).
- ⚠ Environment variables TELEGRAM_API_ID / TELEGRAM_API_HASH must be set in the MCP runtime (e.g., Inspector).
- ⚠ Server is read-only as of README; some expected Telegram actions are not implemented.
Alternatives
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Scores are editorial opinions as of 2026-03-30.