How to reset pending update counter in Telegram Bot API

Other Questions Telegram bot
1

I need help with resetting the pending update counter for my Telegram bot. When I check the webhook status, I see a huge number of unprocessed updates.

When I call the webhook info endpoint, I get this response:

{
  "ok": true,
  "result": {
    "url": "",
    "has_custom_certificate": false,
    "pending_update_count": 3247
  }
}

This counter keeps growing rapidly even though nobody is using the bot. It’s clearly stuck in some kind of loop. I tried removing the webhook URL but that didn’t help.

Later I noticed this error in the webhook info:

{
  "ok": true,
  "result": {
    "url": "https://myserver.com/bot/webhook",
    "has_custom_certificate": false,
    "pending_update_count": 45,
    "last_error_date": 1482910173,
    "last_error_message": "Wrong response from the webhook: 500 Internal Server Error",
    "max_connections": 40
  }
}

What does the 500 error mean and how can I clear all these pending updates? Any suggestions would be appreciated.

2

The 500 Internal Server Error indicates that your webhook endpoint is failing to handle requests properly. This causes Telegram to repeatedly attempt delivery, leading to an increasing pending update count. I encountered a similar issue when my bot’s database connection was misconfigured. It’s crucial to first identify and rectify the cause of the 500 error by reviewing your server logs. After resolving the issue, you can utilize the getUpdates method with a higher offset to remove old updates. Alternatively, consider removing the webhook with deleteWebhook, resolving the underlying problem, and then re-establishing the webhook. Once your endpoint reliably returns a 200 status code, the pending update count should reset to zero.

3

yeah the 500 error is def a server issue. check your code or logs for what’s breakin. after that, use getUpdates with a big offset to clear those old updates. if ur bot’s good, the count should reset itself.

4

Had this exact problem 6 months ago when my webhook started throwing 500s after a server migration. My code wasn’t handling malformed requests properly, which caused the internal server errors. I temporarily switched to long polling with getUpdates instead of webhooks. This clears the pending update queue as you process each update. Fixed the server-side issue causing the 500 errors, switched back to webhooks, and the counter stayed at zero. Key thing: make sure your webhook endpoint always returns a 200 response, even when you can’t process the update. Add basic error handling that catches exceptions but still returns success to Telegram.