TeleDrive

A personal cloud drive that stores your files in Telegram: unlimited storage, a web app, an Android app and a Windows app. There's no backend server; the app runs on your device and talks to Telegram directly.

Website: https://teledrive-storage.vercel.app · Status: Phase 9 (public release). See the roadmap.

Features

• Log in with your Telegram account (phone → code → 2FA password)
• Files are stored in a private channel (TeleDrive Storage) in your own account, created automatically
• Upload multiple files with drag-and-drop, with progress, speed, pause and cancel
• Files over 2 GB are split into chunks automatically
• Download files (streamed straight to disk in Chrome/Edge, so size isn't limited by memory)
• Folders: create, rename, move, delete, nest
• Grid and list views, sorting, breadcrumbs, storage stats
• Syncs between devices automatically
• Thumbnails for photos and videos (made in the browser at upload time)
• Previews: photo gallery (swipe, zoom, arrow keys), video/audio streaming with seeking, PDF (with zoom), Word (.docx), PowerPoint (.pptx), Excel/CSV (.xlsx, .xls, .ods, .csv), Markdown, text/code, and ZIP contents
• Search across all folders (ignores case and accents), plus Photos / Videos / Documents / Audio filters
• Recent, Starred, and Trash (restore, delete forever, auto-emptied after 30 days, Undo)
• Multi-select: checkboxes, Ctrl/Cmd-click, Shift-click, Ctrl+A, long-press on phones; bulk download/move/star/trash
• Interrupted uploads resume: retry, or pick the same file again, even after closing the page
• Everything encrypted: files, names and thumbnails are encrypted on your device with your TeleDrive password before they reach Telegram (Telegram never sees it); streaming and previews still work
• Locked files and folders, each with its own password; a locked folder hides its contents
• Duplicate detection: warns before uploading a file that's already in the drive
• Folder upload (button or drag-and-drop) keeps the folder structure; folders download as ZIP
• Send to Telegram: send a (decrypted) copy of a file to any chat or contact
• Multiple drives (e.g. Personal, Work), each its own private channel, with a switcher
• Get the app on the website: download links for the Windows and Android apps
• Settings: theme, compact density, thumbnails on/off, auto-lock time, lock on close, lock everything, active sessions (log other devices out), check for updates
• Soft Swiss design (DESIGN.md): light and dark themes with a System / Light / Dark switch; works at phone width with bottom tabs, a + button and slide-up action sheets

Windows app (same code, wrapped with Electron): installs like any program, opens from the Start menu, no server to run.

Android app (same code, wrapped with Capacitor):

• "Share → TeleDrive" from any app (Gallery, Files, WhatsApp…), then pick a folder
• Camera backup: new photos/videos go to a Camera Backup folder (Wi-Fi only option); pick more folders (Screenshots, WhatsApp Images…) and turn on backup while the app is closed
• Downloads are saved to Downloads/TeleDrive; "Open with…" hands files to other apps (PDFs, documents)
• Transfers keep running in the background, with progress in a notification
• Back button closes previews/dialogs, then goes up a folder

How it works

 Your browser / phone ──── MTProto (WebSocket) ────► Telegram
   • GramJS                                            private channel =
   • IndexedDB cache                                   files + metadata

• Every file is a message in your private channel. Its caption holds small JSON metadata (name, folder, size…).
• Folders are small marker messages with an ID; files point to their folder's ID.
• The app caches everything in IndexedDB and fetches only what changed (updates.getChannelDifference).
• Document previews (Word, PowerPoint, spreadsheets, Markdown) render inside a sandboxed frame that can't reach the app's storage or the network, so a malicious document can't touch your session.
• Video/audio streaming: a service worker (public/sw.js) turns the player's byte-range requests into Telegram downloads of just those bytes, so you can seek without downloading the whole file.

Full details: REQUIREMENTS.md · IMPLEMENTATION.md · DESIGN.md

Getting started

1. Prerequisites

• Node.js 20+
• Telegram API keys: log in at my.telegram.org → API development tools → create an app (any title) → copy api_id and api_hash

2. Install

git clone https://github.com/samarthbc/teledrive.git
cd teledrive
npm install
cp .env.example .env

Put your keys in .env:

VITE_TG_API_ID=12345678
VITE_TG_API_HASH=your32characterhashhere

.env is git-ignored. Never commit it. If you leave it empty, the app asks for the keys on first launch and stores them on that device only. Public builds (website, release apps) never include these keys: everyone enters their own on the Setup screen.

3. Run

npm run dev      # http://localhost:5173
npm test         # unit tests
npm run build    # production build in dist/ (with your keys, for yourself)

Public release

The website and the downloadable apps are built without API keys; each person enters their own on the Setup screen (once per device).

npm run build:website     # the website (dist/), with a Content-Security-Policy
npm run android:release   # then: cd android && ./gradlew assembleRelease  (signed APK)
npm run desktop:release   # %LOCALAPPDATA%\TeleDrive-build\TeleDrive-Setup.exe

Every public build runs scripts/check-keys.mjs, which fails if your api_hash is inside it.

This is the beginning of the README. Read the rest at the original. Read the full README ↗