The following tools and SDKs are mandatory for the project development:

• Visual Studio 2026, with
  • .NET desktop development
  • Desktop development with C++
  • Universal Windows Platform deveopment
    • Windows 11 SDK (10.0.26100.0)

1. First, check that you have the necessary tools installed.
2. Go to https://my.telegram.org/apps and register a new app.
3. Clone the repository recursively by using git clone --recursive https://github.com/UnigramDev/Unigram.git.
4. Create a new file inside Unigram/Telegram and name it Constants.Secret.cs:

namespace Telegram
{
    public static partial class Constants
    {
        static Constants()
        {
            ApiId = your_api_id;
            ApiHash = "your_api_hash";
            
            AppChannel = "Telegram channel username used for in-app updates";
        }
    }
}

5. Replace your_api_id and your_api_hash with the data obtained from step 2.

Unigram uses NuGet for managed dependencies and vcpkg for unmanaged ones.

If the vcpkg package manager component is selected in the Visual Studio installer, there is nothing to do — the build finds the copy that ships with Visual Studio. Otherwise clone vcpkg next to this repository, so that vcpkg and Unigram are siblings:

> git clone https://github.com/Microsoft/vcpkg.git
> cd vcpkg
> ./bootstrap-vcpkg.bat

The build looks for vcpkg in that order, and VCPKG_ROOT overrides both if you keep it elsewhere.

Two things about that checkout matter:

• It must be complete. Manifest mode checks each port out of the vcpkg git history, so a --depth or --filter clone fails with a confusing git error.
• It must be no older than the commit pinned in vcpkg.json. vcpkg reads its version database from the working tree rather than from the pinned commit, so an older checkout fails with no version database entry for <port> at <date>. If you already have a vcpkg you have used for something else, update it and re-bootstrap:

  > git fetch
  > git checkout <the builtin-baseline commit from vcpkg.json>
  > ./bootstrap-vcpkg.bat

  The build checks this before doing anything and tells you the exact commands if it is behind.

That is the whole setup. Do not run vcpkg integrate install: the repository disables the machine-wide integration so that it always builds against its own pinned commit.

Everything else comes from vcpkg.json in the repository root, which is a manifest: it pins the vcpkg commit (builtin-baseline) and lists the libraries, and the build restores them on demand into vcpkg_installed\<triplet>.

ffmpeg has to be built with a specific set of decoders, so it is vendored as an overlay port in Libraries\vcpkg-ports\ffmpeg, taken from the vcpkg registry with the --enable-* list applied on top. It takes precedence over whichever ffmpeg version the pinned commit happens to carry.

TDLib is built from the same manifest and the same installed tree, so the openssl and zlib it links are the ones the app ships.

In order to communicate with Telegram servers, Unigram uses TDLib. It comes as a submodule and is built by Libraries\tdjson\build.ps1, which exports tdjson.dll, its dependencies and td_api.tl into Libraries\tdjson\<arch> — the paths the app copies from.

Two extra tools are needed for the code generation step:

• CMake 4.4 or later, on PATH. Earlier versions have no Visual Studio 18 generator and will silently fall back to an older toolset.
• PHP, with php.exe on PATH.

Then, from Libraries\tdjson:

> powershell -ExecutionPolicy ByPass ./build.ps1 -arch x64,ARM64

The script picks up VCPKG_ROOT and builds against the manifest in the repository root, so openssl and zlib are the same builds the app links. You can choose to build both x64 and arm64 or just the architecture you need.

LibVLC plays video and audio, and WebRTC backs calls and video chats. Both arrive as prebuilt binaries through the same manifest as everything else, as overlay ports in Libraries\vcpkg-ports. The build downloads an archive for the architecture it is building, verifies it against a SHA512 recorded in the port, and caches it — so there is nothing to install or configure for either.

They are built from UnigramDev/vlc and UnigramDev/webrtc-uwp; the WebRTC fork follows WinRTC. Each release names the commit it was built from.

To change either one, see UnigramDev/deps, which holds the build scripts, the patches and the packaging, and documents how to publish a new archive.

If the code fails to build make sure to create a new issue or to open a pull request.