Telegram Channel Scraper — Public Posts, Views & Monitor

Unofficial tool for publicly accessible Telegram web preview data. Telegram and related trademarks belong to their respective owners. Not affiliated with, sponsored by, or endorsed by Telegram FZ-LLC. Provided for informational use only; users must comply with applicable terms and laws. Public channels with web preview only — no private chats, members, or phone numbers.

Social listening	Product launches
Telegram Channel Scraper ◄── you are here	Bluesky Scraper
Public posts, views, reactions, profiles, keyword filter, monitor	Posts, profiles, search, threads, graph, monitor

Telegram scraper for Apify — extract public channel posts, views, reactions, media URLs, forwards, link previews, and channel profiles from the public web preview, with no login, phone number, or bot token. Use it as a Telegram API alternative from Python, Node.js, or MCP.

Monitor mode stores per-channel watermarks in a named key-value store and returns only posts newer than the last run — built for hourly/daily schedules, brand listening, and competitor tracking.

When to use this Actor

• Archive public channel posts (news, crypto, government, brand, OSINT)
• Pull view counts, reaction tallies, and media CDN URLs without an MTProto session
• Resolve channel profiles (title, bio, subscriber count, verified)
• Keyword / hashtag filter across a list of channels you already follow
• Scheduled incremental monitoring of new posts (optional webhook / bot alerts)

When not to use

• Private groups, invite links (t.me/+, joinchat), or t.me/c/… numeric chats
• Member lists, phone numbers, last-seen, or adding users
• Channels that disabled the public web preview
• Comments from a linked discussion group (not exposed on the public preview)

Key features

• No login — HTTP parse of the public preview (t.me/s/{channel} + embed), not a shared user session
• 4 modes — posts, profiles, keyword search inside given channels, incremental monitor
• Full public post contract — text + HTML, views (1.59M → integer), reactions when present, photos/videos, documents, polls, forwards, replies, link previews, hashtags, mentions
• Multi-channel input — usernames, @handles, t.me / t.me/s URLs, or a single post URL
• Date bounds — ISO dates or relative lookback (7 days, 2 weeks)
• Stable pagination — rel=prev + ?before= with per-channel caps
• Monitor watermarks — lastPostId in a named KV store; optional baseline-only first run
• Preview-disabled channels — one error row, the rest of the run continues
• RateGate — client RPS budget + 429/403 backoff; proxy optional

Input

Parameter	Description
mode	posts, profiles, search, monitor
startUrls	t.me / t.me/s URLs or a single post URL
channels	Usernames or @handles
searchQuery / searchQueries	Keyword filter (required for search)
sinceDate / untilDate	ISO or relative lookback
maxItems	Dataset row cap (0 = unlimited)
maxPostsPerChannel	Per-channel cap
includeChannelInfo	Copy profile fields onto every post (default true)
includeReactions	Parse reaction tallies when the preview includes them
onlyWithMedia / messageTypes	Optional filters
monitorStoreName	Named KV store for watermarks
monitorBaselineOnly	First run: set watermark, push nothing
webhookUrl / telegramToken / telegramChatId	Monitor alerts
concurrency / maxRequestsPerSecond	Throughput (keep modest)
proxyConfiguration	Optional; enable if you see HTTP 403

Channel archive:

{
  "mode": "posts",
  "channels": ["telegram", "durov"],
  "maxItems": 100,
  "includeChannelInfo": true,
  "includeReactions": true,
  "proxyConfiguration": {
    "useApifyProxy": true
  }
}

Keyword search inside channels:

{
  "mode": "search",
  "channels": ["telegram"],
  "searchQuery": "polls",
  "maxItems": 50,
  "sinceDate": "7 days"
}

Monitor (schedule after a baseline run):

{
  "mode": "monitor",
  "channels": ["telegram"],
  "monitorStoreName": "telegram-monitor-brand-x",
  "monitorBaselineOnly": true,
  "maxItems": 200
}

After the baseline run, set monitorBaselineOnly to false (or omit it) so later runs push only new posts. Use a distinct monitorStoreName per schedule.

Output

One dataset row per post (or one profile / error row). Channel fields are copied onto each post so you do not need a join.

Field	Description
type	post, profile, or error
channelUsername / channelTitle / channelSubscriberCount	Channel identity
postId / url / date	Message identity
text / textHtml	Body
views	Integer view count
reactions / totalReactions	Tallies when the preview exposes them
mediaType / photos / videos	Media CDN URLs (time-limited)
linkPreview / forwardedFrom / replyToUrl	Graph
hashtags / mentions / urls	Extracted entities
error	preview_disabled, not_found, private_invite, …
monitorTarget	Present on monitor rows

{
  "type": "post",
  "channelUsername": "examplechannel",
  "channelTitle": "Example Channel",
  "channelVerified": true,
  "channelSubscriberCount": 125000,
  "postId": 123,
  "url": "https://t.me/examplechannel/123",
  "date": "2025-01-15T12:00:00Z",
  "text": "This is an example channel post.",
  "views": 1590000,
  "mediaType": "photo",
  "photos": [{ "url": "https://cdn4.telesco.pe/file/example.jpg" }],
  "reactions": [{ "emoji": "⭐", "isPaid": true, "count": 12 }],
  "totalReactions": 12,
  "hashtags": ["#example"]
}

Export JSON, JSONL, CSV, Excel, or XML from the default dataset.

Use cases

• Brand / OSINT listening — schedule monitor on public announcement channels
• Crypto / news research — archive posts with views and reaction totals
• Content pipelines / RAG — structured post text + source URLs for search indexes
• Competitor tracking — profile subscriber counts plus new posts only
• MCP / agents — call the Actor from an AI assistant without writing a Telethon client

Integration examples

Node.js

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: process.env.APIFY_TOKEN });
const run = await client.actor('crawloop/telegram-channel-scraper').call({
  mode: 'posts',
  channels: ['telegram'],
  maxItems: 20,
});
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items.slice(0, 5));

Python

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient(token)
run = client.actor("crawloop/telegram-channel-scraper").call(
    run_input={"mode": "posts", "channels": ["telegram"], "maxItems": 20}
)
for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(item.get("type"), item.get("channelUsername"), item.get("views"), item.get("text"))

cURL

curl "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/crawloop~telegram-channel-scraper/runs?token=$APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"mode":"posts","channels":["telegram"],"maxItems":20}'

MCP and AI assistants

Use this Actor from AI tools via Apify MCP. Connect your Apify account, then call crawloop/telegram-channel-scraper.

Example prompts:

• "Run Telegram Channel Scraper posts for telegram max 20 and return text, views, and reactions"
• "Search the telegram channel for posts about polls in the last 7 days"
• "Chain Telegram Channel Scraper then Bluesky Scraper for cross-network brand listening"

Suite next step

For public social search and incremental author feeds, use Bluesky Scraper.

FAQ

Do I need a phone number, bot token, or API id?
No. The Actor reads the public web preview. Private data is out of scope.

Why are reactions missing on some channels?
The public preview does not always include reaction HTML. The Actor returns them when present and omits a fake MTProto contract.

Do media URLs last forever?
CDN links from the preview are time-limited. Re-run the Actor when you need a fresh URL. Original file download is not part of this Actor.

What happens if a channel disabled preview?
You get one type: error row with error: preview_disabled. Other channels in the same run continue.

Can I scrape group members?
No. Member lists are not on the public preview and are not collected.

Related Actors

Actor	Role
Telegram Channel Scraper ◄── you are here	Public Telegram posts, profiles, search, monitor
Bluesky Scraper	Bluesky / AT Protocol public data
Product Hunt Scraper	Product launches, reviews, comments