Issue with continuous message sending in Telegram bot created with PHP

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1

I’m currently working on a Telegram bot using PHP, and I’ve run into a problem. I keep user chat IDs in my database to send mass messages. When I enter the command /admin sendall:hello, it should ideally send the message just once to all users. However, at times, it ends up sending the same message repeatedly without stopping, and I have to clear my database to fix it.

Here’s an excerpt of my command handling code:

case '/admin':
    if ($chat_id === 'admin_chat_id') {
        $commandParts = str_replace('/admin', '', $message);
        $commandParts = trim($commandParts);
        $splitCommands = explode(':', $commandParts);
        $AdminCommand = new AdminCommand();
        $AdminCommand->executeCommand($splitCommands[0], $splitCommands[1]);
    } else {
        sendMessage($chat_id, 'You have been blocked.');
    }
    break;

Here’s how the AdminCommand class looks:

class AdminCommand extends Database {

    public function executeCommand($command, $argument = null) {
        switch ($command) {
            case 'sendall':
                $this->sendToAll($argument);
                break;
            default:
                break;
        }
    }

    public function sendToAll($message) {
        $stmt = $this->con->prepare('SELECT * FROM `users`');
        $stmt->execute();
        $userList = $stmt->fetchAll();
        foreach ($userList as $user) {
            sendMessage($user['chatid'], $message);
        }
        exit();
    }
}

This is the sendMessage function I use:

function sendMessage($chatId, $message) {
    $url = BOT_URL . "/sendMessage?chat_id=" . $chatId . "&text=" . urlencode($message);
    file_get_contents($url);
}

Can anyone suggest what might be causing this issue where messages keep looping endlessly?

2

sounds like telegram’s hitting your webhook multiple times for the same update. try adding update_id tracking in ur db to avoid dupes. also, that exit() after sending looks kinda strange - maybe use return instead?

3

Had this exact issue with my first PHP bot. Telegram keeps retrying because it’s not getting a proper HTTP 200 response. Your exit() is probably killing the script before it can respond to Telegram, so Telegram thinks the update failed and keeps retrying. Add http_response_code(200); before your exit, or just ditch the exit and return from the method instead. Also wrap your database stuff in a transaction - prevents half-finished executions if something breaks during mass sending. Fixed my infinite loop problem completely.

4

This happens because of webhook timeouts plus Telegram’s retry system. You’re sending to hundreds or thousands of users, which takes forever and blows past Telegram’s timeout limit. Telegram doesn’t get a response fast enough, thinks your webhook died, and resends the same update - boom, your mass message fires again.

I’ve been through this hell before. Fix it with a queue system. Don’t process everything right away - dump the broadcast job into a separate table and let a background cron handle it. Your webhook responds to Telegram instantly while the actual sending runs in the background.

Also throw in a simple flag or timestamp check so the same command can’t run twice within a few seconds.