telegram-bot-essentials / essence
A Laravel framework for building multi-bot Telegram applications: command, reply-key and callback-query buses, conversational state, and per-bot tenancy.
Package info
github.com/Telegram-Bot-Essentials/essence
pkg:composer/telegram-bot-essentials/essence
Requires
- php: ^8.3
- irazasyed/telegram-bot-sdk: ^3.15
- laravel/framework: ^12 || ^13
- ramsey/uuid: ^4.7
- stancl/tenancy: ^3.9
Requires (Dev)
- larastan/larastan: ^3.0
- laravel/pint: ^1.18
- laravel/telescope: ^5.0
- orchestra/testbench: ^10.0 || ^11.0
- pestphp/pest: ^3.7 || ^4.0
- pestphp/pest-plugin-laravel: ^3.1 || ^4.0
Suggests
- laravel/telescope: Tags handled exceptions with BUG so they can be filtered in the Telescope UI.
This package is auto-updated.
Last update: 2026-09-02 10:29:09 UTC
README
A Laravel package for running many Telegram bots from one codebase, each bot its own tenant. Instead of one giant update handler per bot, incoming webhook updates are dispatched through typed buses - Commands, ReplyKeys, CallbackQueries, and StateAnswers - so a multi-tenant, multi-locale bot platform stays organized as it grows past a handful of features.
Requirements
- PHP ^8.3
- Laravel ^12 or ^13
- irazasyed/telegram-bot-sdk ^3.15
- stancl/tenancy ^3.9 (each bot is a tenant)
Installation
composer require telegram-bot-essentials/essence
Publish config and translations:
php artisan tbe:install php artisan migrate
Initialize your main bot and set the webhook:
php artisan tbe:singlebot:init php artisan tbe:set-webhook
Configure config/tbe-essence.php and .env values (MAIN_TELEGRAM_BOT_TOKEN, MAIN_UNIQUE_ID, MAIN_ADMIN_CHAT_ID, etc.) before running init.
Webhook URL
Each bot receives updates at:
POST /api/{bot_unique_id}/telegram/bot/webhook
Authentication uses the Telegram secret_token header, verified against the hashed token stored on the bots table when you run tbe:set-webhook.
Core Concepts
| Concept | Trigger | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Commands | /start, /help, … |
Slash-command handlers |
| ReplyKeys | Keyboard button text | Main menu and navigation |
| CallbackQueries | Inline button presses | Menus, actions, starting input flows |
| StateAnswers | Text/media while user has active state | Multi-step input, form wizards |
| Features | Called from queries/answers | Build TelegramResponse messages |
| MessageMeta | Associated with messages | Lock, revert, and update bot messages |
| StateData | Referenced by ID | JSON payload storage for wizards and deeplinks |
Project Layout (in your Laravel app)
app/Telegram/
├── CallbackQueries/
│ ├── Admin/
│ └── Member/
├── StateAnswers/
│ ├── Admin/
│ └── Member/
├── ReplyKeys/
│ ├── Admin/
│ └── Member/
├── Features/
│ ├── Admin/
│ └── Member/
└── Commands/
Handlers are discovered from app/Telegram/** once per process/worker at boot, after every companion package has registered its own - so your app's handlers always win a naming collision. Package defaults are loaded from vendor/telegram-bot-essentials/essence/src/Telegram/.
Documentation
The full documentation site — the single source of truth — is maintained separately and being published. It covers:
- Architecture — webhook flow, buses, encoding formats
- State & StateData —
bot_users.statevs thestate_datatable - Extending — building CallbackQueries, StateAnswers, Features
- Commands — CommandBus, aliases, programmatic routing
- Events & Listeners — the bot event bus
- Reference — helpers, config, database, artisan commands
Artisan Generators
php artisan make:callback-query Admin/MyFeatureQuery php artisan make:state-answer Member/MyFeatureAnswer php artisan make:reply-key Member/MyFeatureKey php artisan make:feature Admin/MyFeatureFeature php artisan make:command MyStartCommand
Testing
Extend TelegramBotEssentials\Essence\Testing\TestCase (a Testbench base essence ships in src/) instead of wiring up Testbench yourself - every companion package already depends on essence, so no extra dependency is needed:
use TelegramBotEssentials\Essence\Testing\TestCase; use Illuminate\Foundation\Testing\RefreshDatabase; uses(TestCase::class, RefreshDatabase::class); it('replies when the button is pressed', function () { $bot = $this->makeBot(); $this->postWebhookUpdate($bot, $this->makeMessageUpdate('Main Menu 🔰')) ->assertOk(); $this->assertTelegramSent(fn ($request) => str_contains($request['text'], 'Main Menu loaded')); });
postWebhookUpdate() sends a real request through routing, TelegramBotAuthentication, and the controller - not a hand-wired shortcut. Outbound Telegram API calls are faked automatically (Http::fake() in setUp()): LaravelHttpClient, essence's default http_client_handler, routes every SDK call through Illuminate\Support\Facades\Http, so no bespoke SDK mocking is needed.
Related Packages
Essence is the core framework. Optional companion packages, all on Packagist under
telegram-bot-essentials/*, extend it:
telegram-bot-essentials/settings— per-bot typed key/value settingstelegram-bot-essentials/billing— invoices, payments, gateway registrytelegram-bot-essentials/gateway-card— manual card-to-card gateway for Billingtelegram-bot-essentials/gateway-zibal— Zibal gateway for Billingtelegram-bot-essentials/user-wallet— per-user balance/credit wallettelegram-bot-essentials/user-management— admin user list, sortable/filterabletelegram-bot-essentials/affiliates— referral tracking and wallet payoutstelegram-bot-essentials/announcements— bulk broadcast with live progress
Register their CallbackQueries and StateAnswers in each package's service provider via callbackQueryBus() and stateAnswerBus().
Contributing
See CONTRIBUTING.md for local setup, the test/lint/analyse commands CI runs, and commit conventions.