How Do I Dispatch a Voice Message Via a Telegram Bot Using python-telegram-bot?

Other Questions Telegram bot
1

I’m developing a Telegram bot in Python with the python-telegram-bot library. While my text commands function properly, I now need to send a voice message to a user. Below is a modified snippet of my current approach. I use a text-to-speech engine to create an MP3 file. How can I deliver this audio file to the chat?


def begin_bot(msg, ctx):
    speaker = pyttsx3.init()
    speaker.save_to_file('Hello, welcome to our bot!', 'greeting.mp3')
    speaker.runAndWait()

Any guidance on sending the generated audio file to a user would be appreciated.

2

In my experience, issues with sending a voice message can sometimes be resolved by converting the generated MP3 file into the OGG format that Telegram expects for voice messages. I used a command line tool like ffmpeg to perform this conversion before sending it, which resolved playback problems on some devices. After conversion, opening the file in binary mode and using the send_voice method in your python-telegram-bot workflow ensures better compatibility. This extra conversion step might seem redundant, but it significantly reduces the risk of format-related errors when dispatching voice messages through your bot.

3

Over time, I found that sending a voice message effectively with python-telegram-bot required a bit more fine tuning than simply opening the file. In one project, I ended up converting the MP3 output to OGG while ensuring the correct audio settings (like mono channel and appropriate bitrate) were applied. This method kept the voice message playback uniform across various Telegram clients. I also experimented with buffering the file in memory, which slightly reduced latency compared to disk access. Adjusting these attributes helped improve the success rate of dispatching voice messages in the bot.

4

The key issue lies in delivering the generated file as a voice message. One method that worked well was to open the file in binary mode and transmit it using the send_voice method from your bot. For instance, after generating the file your code could include something like:

with open(‘greeting.mp3’, ‘rb’) as voice_file:
context.bot.send_voice(chat_id=update.effective_chat.id, voice=voice_file)

This approach ensured that the audio was correctly loaded and sent to the chat, preserving the format expected by Telegram.

5

I faced a similar challenge and eventually opted to use an in-memory file object rather than dealing directly with the filesystem. After generating the audio file, loading it into an io.BytesIO object allows you to reset the pointer and directly send it with the send_voice method. In this arrangement you can bypass the need for file management on disk which sometimes introduces latency or race conditions in multi-threaded environments. It streamlined my workflow and enhanced performance by reducing disk I/O operations.

6

hey, you could also try using send_audio after opening the file in rb mode. i had good results with that approach, works similar to send_voice but sometimes gets around format issues. give it a try and see if it suits your case!