Telegram verified badge: how to get one for your company
Applying for Telegram's badge goes through @VerifyBot. Approval depends on the company's presence outside Telegram. The blue badge then marks the company's channel, group or bot as an official source. The badge gives no extra features, and Telegram does not present it as protection against look-alikes.
Who Telegram verifies
Telegram verifies the official channels, bots and public groups of public figures and organizations, so that users can tell official sources from the rest. Telegram calls the chats it verifies large and active but gives no minimum audience. It does not verify personal accounts at the moment, even the account of a company's founder or manager.
What to prepare before you apply
Telegram generally verifies chats of companies with notable verified accounts on at least two of seven platforms: TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, VK and Snapchat. The bio of each account must link to the Telegram channel, bot or group, so Telegram can confirm that the accounts and the chat have the same owner.
| What Telegram asks for | Details | What can stand in |
|---|---|---|
| Verified accounts on other platforms | At least two of the seven, each with a link to the Telegram chat in its bio | An undisputed Wikipedia page that meets Wikipedia's notability criteria, or the organization's official website, can count as one missing account if it links to the chat |
| Press coverage | At least two articles that mention the company, preferably from a well-known, long-standing publisher and in English; they need not link to Telegram | An undisputed Wikipedia page that meets Wikipedia's notability criteria and links to the chat can count as one missing article |
| Application | Through @VerifyBot, once the bio links are in place | — |
Telegram names no fee, no processing time, no reason for a refusal and no appeal route, so do not plan a campaign or channel launch around the badge. Settle the channel's name and t.me link first: a verified channel cannot change either while it holds the badge.
What the badge shows and what it does not
A verified chat carries a blue badge in chat lists, on its profile and in search results. The badge means that the chat is official and that Telegram approved the application for it. It is not an endorsement of what the chat publishes.
Verification gives no additional abilities in Telegram; it is one way to show that a channel is official. According to Telegram, a link to the channel on the company's official site or its other official accounts can achieve a similar result. Telegram does mention one difference, in global search: for users in the EU, it ranks channels and groups by subscriber count and lists verified ones first. It says nothing about the order elsewhere.
Telegram names no advantage for a verified channel in ads and does not say that ads require a badge.
Other kinds of verification are not the badge
Since January 2025, official third-party services can add their own verification icons to user accounts and chats, to help prevent scams and misinformation. Such a service needs an official bot that Telegram has already verified.
Only Telegram assigns the official badge, and third-party verifiers use completely different icons. When someone outside a user's contacts messages them for the first time, Telegram shows whether the sender is an official account, has third-party verification or is a regular user. Telegram does not list the verifiers or explain how a company gets such an icon.
"Verification Platform 2.0", announced in March 2025, is easy to confuse with the badge. It is Telegram Gateway, a service for sending login codes, and has nothing to do with the badge.
What to do about impostors
Telegram has two labels for suspicious chats: FAKE means that many users reported the chat as fake or a scam, and SCAM means that the chat is probably a scam. For users in the EU, Telegram says that accounts, bots and channels that impersonate others or try to defraud users may get such a label on their public profile.
If a scammer pretends to be you, Telegram names @NoToScam, though it offers that route to people and says nothing about companies. Illegal content can be flagged with the Report button in any Telegram app. For reports about illegal public content, Telegram says it performs legal checks and takes the content down when it deems it appropriate. A copyright owner, or an agent authorized by the owner, can send a complaint about a bot or channel to dmca@telegram.org.
Telegram mentions no separate route for trademark complaints and no steps for reporting a whole channel as an impostor. What you can do yourself is show customers the real channel: put its link on your website and on the company's accounts on other platforms.
Brands, logos and channel names in Adstat ad accounts
Impersonation is banned in ads too. Telegram Ads does not allow ads that impersonate brands or misuse their logos, or destinations that imitate a legitimate website or use other brands' names to mislead.
Adstat works inside an agency or reseller ad account, and in the ad accounts we run, ad review looks at the whole funnel, not only at the ad. A channel that offers a service under another company's brand cannot use that brand's logo without proof of a partnership. The ad must also match the content of the channel, bot or website it leads to.
In the ad accounts we run, changing a channel's name, avatar or description during a campaign sends all its ads back to moderation. Our service does not issue badges and does not replace Telegram's verification.
Questions and answers
How can a verified channel be renamed?
Send /unverify to @VerifyBot, make the change and apply again through the bot. Telegram does not say whether the earlier approval carries over, so expect a new check.
Does a channel lose the badge if its avatar or description changes?
Telegram does not say so: it describes the restriction only for the name and the t.me link. After such a change, check that the blue badge is still on the channel.
Can the badge be bought?
Telegram names no fee for verification and describes no way to buy the badge, so treat an offer to sell one with suspicion.
What to do first
- Settle the channel's name and t.me link first: you will put the link in bios and on the website, and a verified channel cannot change either.
- Check that the company has notable verified accounts on at least two of the seven platforms, and add a link to the Telegram channel in each bio.
- Collect at least two press articles that mention the company. If one account or one article is missing, an undisputed Wikipedia page that meets Wikipedia's notability criteria and links to the channel can count in its place.
- Put a link to the channel on the company's website: it can stand in for one missing account and helps customers find the real channel.
- Apply through @VerifyBot once the links are in place.
- Tell customers where the official channel is. If a look-alike copies material you own, send a copyright complaint to dmca@telegram.org.
- Do not use other brands' logos without proof of a partnership, and make sure each ad promises what the channel or site it leads to actually offers. During a campaign, do not change the channel's name, avatar or description.