OpenClaw Stopped Replying on Telegram After an Upgrade? This Is Probably Why

Your OpenClaw Telegram bot was working perfectly. You ran openclaw update. Now the bot shows as online in Telegram but does not reply to anything. No pairing prompt, no error banner, just silence. Messages disappear into the void.

This is one of the most common post-upgrade surprises, and the fix takes about two minutes once you know what changed. Upgrades tightened how OpenClaw matches Telegram identities: allowlist entries in the old @username format stopped matching reliably, and OpenClaw now wants numeric Telegram user IDs everywhere identity checks happen. When your message arrives and the configured identity does not match, it is dropped as if it came from an unknown sender. Silent, by design.

What changed in the upgrade

Two identity rules hardened in recent OpenClaw versions, and both produce the same silent symptom:

• Username entries no longer match. Setup now asks for numeric user IDs only. Config that still lists @yourhandle under an allowlist field does not match your actual sender ID (something like 6227582470), so every message from you is treated as unauthorized and dropped. OpenClaw includes a migration helper for this exact case: openclaw doctor --fix resolves old @username entries to numeric IDs on a best-effort basis (it needs the bot token configured).
• Group authorization stopped inheriting DM approvals. Since 2026.2.25, group sender authorization never inherits DM pairing-store approvals. If your bot used to answer in a group because you had approved a DM pairing, that path is now closed by default: groups read their own allowlist sources (groupAllowFrom, falling back to allowFrom). DM pairing now grants DM access only, nothing else.

On top of those, two quieter defaults cause the same silence: requireMention: true on a group means plain group messages never trigger the bot (mention it with @your_bot), and BotFather privacy mode hides group messages the bot was not directly addressed in. More on those below.

Confirm this is your problem

Tail the logs and send yourself a message on Telegram:

user@host:~$ openclaw logs --follow

Send a DM to the bot and watch what the log does with it. If the incoming message is rejected or never routed to a session, and the line mentions the sender or the allowlist, identity matching is your problem. A working message, by contrast, is routed and answered. The from.id in the logged update is your numeric user ID, which you need for the fix (more below).

Step 1: See what your channel config actually holds

Open the current Telegram block and look for identity fields:

user@host:~$ openclaw config get channels.telegram

{
  "enabled":  true,
  "groups":  {
    "*":  { "requireMention": true }
  },
  "botToken":  { "source": "env", "id": "TELEGRAM_BOT_TOKEN" },
  "dmPolicy":  "pairing",
  "groupPolicy":  "allowlist"
}
# allowFrom is where numeric user IDs go. Pairing mode grants DM access by approval.

A few things to look for. If dmPolicy is pairing, DM access is granted by approving a pairing request, and allowFrom may be empty; that is a valid setup, but remember pairing covers DMs only. If dmPolicy is allowlist, then allowFrom must contain your numeric ID or every DM is dropped. And if any field anywhere still holds @something entries, those are the legacy entries that stopped working.

Step 2: Get your numeric user ID

You need the number (for example 6227582470), not your username. Three ways to get it:

• Safest, no third party: DM your bot while openclaw logs --follow is running and read from.id from the logged update.
• Quick: message @userinfobot (or @getidsbot); it replies instantly with your numeric ID.
• Official API: call the Bot API getUpdates method with your bot token and read message.from.id from the JSON.

Step 3: Put numeric IDs in the right fields

The same identity is read by three different access paths, and each reads its own config field. The diagram shows where everything goes:

Concretely, to authorize yourself for DMs and as the owner:

# One-owner bot pattern (JSON5 in ~/.openclaw/openclaw.json)
channels: {
  telegram: {
    dmPolicy: "allowlist",
    allowFrom: ["6227582470"],
    groupPolicy: "allowlist",
    groups: { "-1001234567890": { requireMention: true } }
  }
},
commands: { ownerAllowFrom: ["telegram:6227582470"] }

Notes that save you a round trip:

• groupAllowFrom is optional for one-owner bots. When it is unset, groups fall back to allowFrom, so your DM identity also works in allowed groups.
• groups holds negative chat IDs (like -1001234567890), never your user ID. With groupPolicy: "allowlist" (the default) a group stays blocked until its chat ID is listed or "*" is used.
• commands.ownerAllowFrom wants the prefixed form telegram:<your user id>. This is what unlocks owner-only commands and exec approvals from Telegram.
• The telegram: or tg: prefix is accepted and normalized on allowlist entries, so you may see either form in examples.

Then apply and confirm the channel comes back:

the fix: numeric IDs everywhere
# 1. Auto-migrate old @username entries to numeric IDs (needs the bot token)
openclaw doctor --fix

# 2. Or edit ~/.openclaw/openclaw.json and use numeric IDs:
#    channels: {
#      telegram: {
#        dmPolicy: "allowlist",
#        allowFrom: ["6227582470"],
#        groupPolicy: "allowlist",
#        groups: { "-1001234567890": { requireMention: true } }
#      }
#    }
#    commands: { ownerAllowFrom: ["telegram:6227582470"] }

# 3. Apply, then confirm the channel comes back
openclaw gateway restart
openclaw channels status --probe

The probe output on a healthy channel reads like this. The fields that matter: running, connected, a recent in/out time, and works at the end. If you see works after the restart but the bot still ignores you in a DM, the channel is fine and the identity config is still dropping you, so re-check allowFrom. If the probe itself fails, the channel is not the problem; the gateway is, and the related fixes at the bottom of this post cover those cases.

user@host:~$ openclaw channels status --probe

Checking channel status (probe)...
Gateway reachable.
- Telegram default:  enabled, configured, running, connected, in:11h ago, out:11h ago,
  transport: just now, mode:polling, bot:@rerealize_bot, token:config, works
# After the fix you want to see: connected ... mode:polling ... works

Step 4: If group messages are still silent

When DMs work but groups stay quiet, work through these in order:

• Mention the bot. With requireMention: true (the default in many setups, and present on the config shown above), plain group messages never trigger the bot. Test with @your_bot ping.
• Check the group is allowed. Under groupPolicy: "allowlist", your group chat ID must be listed under channels.telegram.groups.
• Check BotFather privacy mode. Run /setprivacy with @BotFather. Privacy mode on means Telegram only forwards the bot messages that mention it, so group silence with mention-based triggers is expected. Disable privacy mode if you want the bot to see all group traffic, or keep it on and always mention the bot.
• Re-check the sender path. Group sender authorization comes from groupAllowFrom or the allowFrom fallback, never from DM pairing history.

Quick reference

# Diagnose: watch an incoming message
openclaw logs --follow

# Inspect identity config
openclaw config get channels.telegram

# Migrate legacy @username entries (needs bot token)
openclaw doctor --fix

# Apply and verify
openclaw gateway restart
openclaw channels status --probe

Related fixes

Silence after an upgrade has a few other faces. If nothing arrives in any channel, see channel routing. If commands run but every exec pauses for approval, see the exec approval fix, and if the gateway itself will not start, the EADDRINUSE fix. New to OpenClaw? Start with The Complete OpenClaw Guide.

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