How can I prove to my subscribers that the draw was fair?

The giveaway post shows a hash of a secret seed from the start. The result post shows the seed. Anyone can take sha256 of the seed and compare it with the hash. The winners are a fixed result of the seed and the participant list, so the organiser cannot choose them after the fact.

Does the bot need admin rights?

The bot must be an admin of the channel or group where the giveaway is posted, and you must be an admin there too. The wizard checks both before it posts.

Can I give a prize that is not Telegram Premium or Stars?

Yes. The prize is a line of text, 200 characters at most. You hand it over yourself, because the bot only tells the winners that you will be in touch.

Yes, for 1 winner and up to 500 participants. Pro is optional, 150 Stars one time for one chat, and adds up to 10 winners, a re-draw and CSV export.

How to Run a Fair Giveaway in a Telegram Channel

People distrust giveaways, and they are right to. In many channels the winner is picked by the admin, in a comment thread, with nothing to check. A fair giveaway needs three things: clear entry rules, a draw that the organiser cannot steer, and a result that anyone can check afterward.

Telegram has its own giveaway feature for channels. Its prizes are Telegram's own, Premium subscriptions or Stars, and Telegram picks the winners; a channel can name an extra prize of its own, but only next to a Premium or Stars prize that it pays for. If your prize is only something of your own, such as a product, a course, a gift card or a service, you need another tool. @GiveawayDrawProBot posts a giveaway with a Join button in your channel or group, draws the winners at the deadline and publishes a seed that proves the draw.

This guide shows how to create a giveaway, how people enter, and what the proof does and does not prove.

Keep reading

Steps

Make the bot an admin of your channel or group. Add @GiveawayDrawProBot as an admin with permission to post messages. You must be an admin of that chat too, and the bot checks both before it posts. The add link does not give the bot rights by itself, so set them in the admin list of your channel.
Open the bot in a private chat and send /new. The bot asks for the prize first: one line, 200 characters at most, with no links. Then it asks how many winners you want. Free giveaways have 1 winner. Send /cancel at any step to stop.
Set the deadline. Send a duration such as 2h, 3d or 1d12h, or a UTC time such as 2026-10-20 18:00. The deadline must be between 1 hour and 30 days from now. The bot draws at that moment.
Decide on bonus tickets, then name the chat. With bonus tickets on, every participant gets a personal invite link, and each new member who joins through it gives the inviter 1 extra ticket, up to 5 extra. The draw stays verifiable. Leave it off if you want one ticket each. Then send the channel as @username, a t.me link or a numeric id.
Check the post and share the rules. The bot posts the giveaway with the prize, the deadline, the number of participants and the beginning of a hash. People tap Join, then press Start in the chat with the bot. The bot checks that they are members of your chat. You cannot join your own giveaway. Add your own rules in a normal post if you need more.
Read the result and verify the draw. At the deadline the bot posts the winners and the secret seed. Take sha256 of the seed with any tool: it must equal the hash that was in the post from the start. The bot also writes to each winner and sends you the winners. Contact the winners yourself, because the bot does not send the prize.

Good to know

Free: 1 winner, up to 500 participants and 1 required chat, the chat where the giveaway is posted. A line of the bot appears under the giveaway.
Pro is per chat and optional: 150 Telegram Stars, one time, for good. It allows up to 10 winners, up to 100,000 participants, up to 5 required chats, one re-draw and CSV export of the participants, and it removes the line of the bot. Add a required chat to a giveaway with /require, and see your giveaways with /mine.
The hash proves that the seed was fixed before anyone joined and was not changed after. To recompute the winners yourself you need the list of participants in join order, and the CSV export of that list is part of Pro.
The bot checks membership of the chat when a person joins and again for each candidate winner, so a winner who left the chat before the draw is skipped. It does not check who is a real person, and one person with two accounts can enter twice.
The bot sends no prize. Check the rules for prize draws in your country before you run one.
For each participant the bot stores the Telegram id, the display name and the time of joining, and with bonus tickets the invite code and who invited whom.

Add to a group See GiveawayDrawProBot About the bot

FAQ

How can I prove to my subscribers that the draw was fair?: The giveaway post shows a hash of a secret seed from the start. The result post shows the seed. Anyone can take sha256 of the seed and compare it with the hash. The winners are a fixed result of the seed and the participant list, so the organiser cannot choose them after the fact.
Does the bot need admin rights?: The bot must be an admin of the channel or group where the giveaway is posted, and you must be an admin there too. The wizard checks both before it posts.
Can I give a prize that is not Telegram Premium or Stars?: Yes. The prize is a line of text, 200 characters at most. You hand it over yourself, because the bot only tells the winners that you will be in touch.
Is it free?: Yes, for 1 winner and up to 500 participants. Pro is optional, 150 Stars one time for one chat, and adds up to 10 winners, a re-draw and CSV export.

Related guides

Related bots

GiveawayDrawProBot — Posts a giveaway in your channel or group and draws the winners at the deadline.
AnonInboxProBot — A personal link where strangers write to you anonymously; you reply and can block.
AnonSayProBot — Post anonymously into a Telegram group through the bot.
JoinApproveProBot — Approves every join request at once and sends each new member one welcome message.

Curious what the Pro features cost? See pricing.