Control Claude Code from Telegram or Discord with Channels

TL;DR Claude Code now accepts messages from Telegram and Discord while working in your terminal. Text it from your phone, it executes, and replies through the same channel. Bidirectional, secure (sender allowlist), activated with --channels.

Channels is a system that pushes external events into your Claude Code session via an MCP server. Telegram, Discord, or any service you implement. Claude reads the message, acts with all its tools (bash, editing, reading, subagents), and replies through the same channel.

If this sounds like what OpenClaw does — an AI assistant that lives in your chat apps and executes tasks on your machine — it's no coincidence. Anthropic is building that same vision, but integrated natively into Claude Code: with access to hooks, skills, subagents, and MCP.

Result — you text your Telegram bot:

You (Telegram): Are any tests failing in the project?

Claude Code (terminal): runs npm test, analyzes results

Claude Code (Telegram): 2 tests failing in auth.test.ts:
  - testLoginExpiredToken: expected 401, got 500
  - testRefreshToken: timeout after 5s

Setup (Telegram)

1. Create a Telegram bot

Open BotFather in Telegram, send /newbot, give it a name, and copy the token.

2. Install the plugin

/plugin install telegram@claude-plugins-official

3. Configure the token

/telegram:configure <your-token>

4. Restart with channels enabled

claude --channels plugin:telegram@claude-plugins-official

5. Pair your account

Send any message to your bot in Telegram. It replies with a pairing code. In Claude Code:

/telegram:access pair <code>
/telegram:access policy allowlist

The second line locks access to your account only.

Reference

Aspect	Detail
What it is	MCP server that pushes events into your session
Supported channels	Telegram, Discord, fakechat (localhost demo)
Direction	Bidirectional — Claude reads and replies through the same channel
Security	Sender allowlist + pairing code
Activation flag	`--channels plugin:<name>@claude-plugins-official`
Session required	Claude Code must be running (not a persistent service)
Permissions	Permission prompts pause the session until you approve locally
Status	Research preview (v2.1.80+)
Authentication	claude.ai login only (no API key or Console)
Enterprise	Disabled by default — admin must enable `channelsEnabled`

Official docs: Channels — Push events into a running session

Requirements

Claude Code v2.1.80+
Bun installed (bun --version to verify)
claude.ai login (API key not supported)
Team/Enterprise: admin must enable channels in managed settings