Flex-to-Earn: Telegram Gifts 101
$304 million FDV and $210 million MC. Over 200,000 active traders. Dozens of marketplaces emerged in just half a year. Pudgy’s @lucanetz and @SnoopDogg themselves joined the show.
Even if that doesn’t sound immediately exciting to a typical crypto OG (whose dopamine receptors may be completely fried) — Telegram Gifts are quickly becoming a major development for Telegram, TON, and, by extension, the broader crypto space. After all, in this phase of the cycle, it’s still rare to see an asset bought for $30 later sell for $37,400 (Plush Pepes). It is about trading, speculating and , status demonstration and identification, social flexing merging with onchain hierarchy - similar to what was happening in the 2021 NFT bullrun, yet in a much more complex and sophisticated way.
In this article, we’ll cover the most important things about Telegram Gifts:
Even if that doesn’t sound immediately exciting to a typical crypto OG (whose dopamine receptors may be completely fried) — Telegram Gifts are quickly becoming a major development for Telegram, TON, and, by extension, the broader crypto space. After all, in this phase of the cycle, it’s still rare to see an asset bought for $30 later sell for $37,400 (Plush Pepes). It is about trading, speculating and , status demonstration and identification, social flexing merging with onchain hierarchy - similar to what was happening in the 2021 NFT bullrun, yet in a much more complex and sophisticated way.
In this article, we’ll cover the most important things about Telegram Gifts:
- Gifts and NFTs on TON
- Step-by-step instructions on what to do with the Gifts
- REP plans related to Gifts
- Brief history of Gifts
Short Summary
Telegram Gifts Dune Dashboard https://dune.com/rdmcd/telegram-gifts, Giftstats: https://giftstat.com/, historical NFT data from Dune https://dune.com/sealaunch/NFT
Gifts or something else?
For the first look at the gifts, go to Telegram settings and scroll down to the “Send a Gift” option. You will see dozens of collections: Ginger Cookie, Kissed Frog, Crystal Ball and many others. Some are sold for 300 stars (Telegram in-app currency) and some are priced at 10,000 stars — approx $5 and $150 respectively, should you buy stars on Fragment.
The utility seems to be simple — just a cute image to send to a friend or put on your Telegram profile for a small ego-boost.
It is not that simple, of course. Let’s follow the rabbithole.
After buying/receiving the gift, one can upgrade it and a whole new market is opened — NFTs on TON.
Anyone can launch a standard NFT collection on TON — just like on other networks. There are hundreds of collections, with $296 million in sales volume and 6 million unique traders.
The utility seems to be simple — just a cute image to send to a friend or put on your Telegram profile for a small ego-boost.
It is not that simple, of course. Let’s follow the rabbithole.
After buying/receiving the gift, one can upgrade it and a whole new market is opened — NFTs on TON.
Anyone can launch a standard NFT collection on TON — just like on other networks. There are hundreds of collections, with $296 million in sales volume and 6 million unique traders.
TON NFT Dashboard on Dune: https://dune.com/rdmcd/ton-nft
Gifts are different. As they are only launched by Telegram, the only options to acquire them as NFTs are:
Some examples:
- Buy a gift when a new gift “collection” is dropped during a primary sale — the soldout can happen really fast, one of the latest collection - Ice Cream, was sold in 37 mins.
- Buy the gift as an NFT when it’s upgraded.
Some examples:
As of June 12
Some collections are more popular among the celebs, for example: Snoop Dogg owns a Vintage Cigar, Swiss Watch, and Record Player – among other gifts; Luca Netz owns Heroic Helmet, Snow Mittens, Easter Egg and others. Pavel Durov owns Witch Hat, Love Potion, Ginger Cookie – and others.
Telegram Gifts Dune Dashboard: https://dune.com/rdmcd/telegram-gifts
The gifts can be burned, thus decreasing the total supply for the collection. Example: 4,206 Heroic Helmets burned, decreasing the supply by 52.3%.
And, like normal NFTs, one can earn gifts through competitions and challenges – for example, playing Void could have landed you the Swiss Watch gift. There are also cases, roulettes, and so on and so forth.
Since March 2025 we have also witnessed the beginning of GiFi emergence - one stake their gifts, even before they are onchain, and earn rewards in $TON, $USDt or $TONNEL with an APR which can be sometimes comparable to the DeFi Summer yield farms:
And, like normal NFTs, one can earn gifts through competitions and challenges – for example, playing Void could have landed you the Swiss Watch gift. There are also cases, roulettes, and so on and so forth.
Since March 2025 we have also witnessed the beginning of GiFi emergence - one stake their gifts, even before they are onchain, and earn rewards in $TON, $USDt or $TONNEL with an APR which can be sometimes comparable to the DeFi Summer yield farms:
For now, NFTs on TON have not sparked the same culture and impact as in the previous cycle: no real equivalent to Punks, Pudgies or Miladies (even though there is TON version of each of these collections) has surfaced yet. But still, the renaissance of NFTs can easily happen on TON: it is already the 2nd biggest network in terms of onchain NFT trading volume, surpassed only by Ethereum - and should we count the offchain trades, TON frequently surpass even Ethereum starting from June 2nd 2025.
Gift collections are already one the most important subsets of NFTs on TON and are among the biggest categories in terms of weekly volume, together with Telegram Usernames and anonymous Telegram Numbers (both are utility NFTs).
Curious to learn more about NFTs on TON? There is a great guide by @zenithTON.
Gift collections are already one the most important subsets of NFTs on TON and are among the biggest categories in terms of weekly volume, together with Telegram Usernames and anonymous Telegram Numbers (both are utility NFTs).
Curious to learn more about NFTs on TON? There is a great guide by @zenithTON.
Step-by-step instructions
two ways to acquire a gift
1. Through the primary sale — i.e., you buy it straight from Telegram whenever there is a new drop.
Benefits: the gift can be bought at the lowest price.
Downsides: need to act fast — the new drop can sell out in minutes, potentially even seconds.
2. Through the secondary market — choose any marketplace and pick any gift on sale.
Benefits: you can buy anytime, no rush or stress.
Downsides: the price is significantly higher than in the primary sale.
Benefits: the gift can be bought at the lowest price.
Downsides: need to act fast — the new drop can sell out in minutes, potentially even seconds.
2. Through the secondary market — choose any marketplace and pick any gift on sale.
Benefits: you can buy anytime, no rush or stress.
Downsides: the price is significantly higher than in the primary sale.
How to do the primary sale
1. Buy Stars, if you don’t have any: go to Telegram Settings, scroll down to “My Stars,” click the buy button.
2. Wait for a new collection to be dropped by Telegram. One way to track it — subscribe to this channel or a similar one and wait for a notification about new gifts.
3. Buy gifts through the Telegram app: Click Settings → Send a Gift → Select yourself → Choose the new collection. The system uses FCFS (First-Come, First-Served), and the demand is high — you’ll likely have just a few minutes.
4. Use a drop tracker to get notified whenever a new collection appears. One of the options is t.me/GiftChanges.
5. After a certain time (it varies case by case), the gift will become upgradable. Upgrading gives the gift three traits: model, symbol, and backdrop (background).
6. Wait 21 days after upgrading to trade on the secondary market.
2. Wait for a new collection to be dropped by Telegram. One way to track it — subscribe to this channel or a similar one and wait for a notification about new gifts.
3. Buy gifts through the Telegram app: Click Settings → Send a Gift → Select yourself → Choose the new collection. The system uses FCFS (First-Come, First-Served), and the demand is high — you’ll likely have just a few minutes.
4. Use a drop tracker to get notified whenever a new collection appears. One of the options is t.me/GiftChanges.
5. After a certain time (it varies case by case), the gift will become upgradable. Upgrading gives the gift three traits: model, symbol, and backdrop (background).
6. Wait 21 days after upgrading to trade on the secondary market.
How to trade on a marketplace
Pick any marketplace of your choice. Here are the most popular, ordered by volume, some allow onchain trading and some allow offchain trading:
- TONNEL (offchain)
- Portals (offchain)
- Getgems
- Fragment (official platform with direct Telegram integration)
- OTC ELF (offchain)
- MRKT (offchain)
- MarketApp
- Giftpot
- giftON
Secondary trades can happen on the TON blockchain — you will need a TON wallet.
You can use Telegram’s native wallet (buy $TON with a bank card or Apple Pay), or connect third-party wallets like Tonkeeper, MyTonWallet, Tonhub, and others.
You can use Telegram’s native wallet (buy $TON with a bank card or Apple Pay), or connect third-party wallets like Tonkeeper, MyTonWallet, Tonhub, and others.
Gifts and reputation
Every gift you buy, send, or flip builds your footprint. And REP will be tracking it (to some extent).
Because this isn’t just a marketplace.
It is a social economy.
Whenever you decide to buy an Ion Gem or send a Kissed Frog — rest assured, we’ll update your REP accordingly.
A silent guardian of your reputation and social connections. A watchful protector. REP.
Seriously, gifts are a great tool for measuring both on-chain activity and social scores — and we cannot ignore that.
And what if there was a gated group chat for the most devoted Gift collectors? 🤔
Because this isn’t just a marketplace.
It is a social economy.
Whenever you decide to buy an Ion Gem or send a Kissed Frog — rest assured, we’ll update your REP accordingly.
A silent guardian of your reputation and social connections. A watchful protector. REP.
Seriously, gifts are a great tool for measuring both on-chain activity and social scores — and we cannot ignore that.
And what if there was a gated group chat for the most devoted Gift collectors? 🤔
The Brief history of Gifts
Telegram launched Gifts in early October 2024. The initial utility was simple: hedonic value — a cute image to send to a friend. There was also a small value-transfer aspect, as gifts could be instantly converted into Stars. However, the recipient would receive slightly fewer Stars than the sender spent — for example, a 15-Star gift might yield 13 Stars if converted. By January 2025, a secondary market for gifts emerged. A major update introduced the ability to upgrade gifts into collectibles, which are essentially TON NFTs.
For now, gift collections are launched exclusively by the Telegram team and begin as offchain assets. After 21 days, each gift becomes eligible for NFT conversion on the TON blockchain. These NFTs can be traded across existing marketplaces, including Telegram’s official marketplace, launched with the May 8th, 2025 update.
Looking deeper into the concept of Telegram Gifts, there's a clear resemblance to VK.com’s gift system. VK (initially launched by the Durov brothers in 2006) was a major Facebook alternative in post-Soviet countries. VK introduced its own digital gifts in 2007. The model was simple: VK’s team would release gift collections (with unlimited supply), and anyone could purchase a gift to send to a friend or influencer. Gifts became a form of communication. For instance, even if someone was banned by a particular VK user, they could still send them a gift — complete with a message. Early on, there was virtually no content moderation or censorship and VK users discovered an expected utility for gifts: bypass the moderation and submit honest feedback to services they didn't like.
Initially, VK gifts were free. Paid gifts were introduced in 2008 and quickly became one of VK’s revenue streams.
A core difference between Telegram Gifts and VK’s system is the presence of a secondary market. In VK, gifts were not transferable after they were sent — recipients couldn’t resell them. In Telegram, however, recipients can either:
For now, gift collections are launched exclusively by the Telegram team and begin as offchain assets. After 21 days, each gift becomes eligible for NFT conversion on the TON blockchain. These NFTs can be traded across existing marketplaces, including Telegram’s official marketplace, launched with the May 8th, 2025 update.
Looking deeper into the concept of Telegram Gifts, there's a clear resemblance to VK.com’s gift system. VK (initially launched by the Durov brothers in 2006) was a major Facebook alternative in post-Soviet countries. VK introduced its own digital gifts in 2007. The model was simple: VK’s team would release gift collections (with unlimited supply), and anyone could purchase a gift to send to a friend or influencer. Gifts became a form of communication. For instance, even if someone was banned by a particular VK user, they could still send them a gift — complete with a message. Early on, there was virtually no content moderation or censorship and VK users discovered an expected utility for gifts: bypass the moderation and submit honest feedback to services they didn't like.
Initially, VK gifts were free. Paid gifts were introduced in 2008 and quickly became one of VK’s revenue streams.
A core difference between Telegram Gifts and VK’s system is the presence of a secondary market. In VK, gifts were not transferable after they were sent — recipients couldn’t resell them. In Telegram, however, recipients can either:
- Instantly convert the gift into Stars (Telegram’s in-app currency), or
- Upgrade the gift to a convertible collectible, turning it into a TON NFT and enabling resale on the secondary market.
Would you like to learn more?
Some resources that can help you understand gifts and NFTs on TON:
Dune Dashboard:
Giftstat:
Some telegram groups and channels:
- https://dune.com/rdmcd/telegram-gifts
- https://dune.com/pascal04/ton-gifts-the-economy
- https://dune.com/ton_foundation/nft
Giftstat:
Some telegram groups and channels:
- t.me/stenka
- t.me/tonmafiaonton
- t.me/tonundrwrld
- t.me/gift_newstg
- REP in Telegram
- REP App