Public Activity Catalog
The catalog is a showcase of your activities for people who aren't subscribed to any of your channels yet. It's browsed by participants of other giveaways and subscribers of other channels - exactly the audience your own post in your own channel can never reach. Appearing in the catalog doesn't guarantee any specific growth, but it gives your activity a chance it simply wouldn't have otherwise.
Why It Matters#
Normally an activity is only discovered by your existing subscribers - people who already see posts in your channel. The catalog works differently: it's a dedicated section of the mini app that people open specifically to find a new giveaway. If your activity is listed there, it can be found and opened by someone who has never heard of your channel before.
This is an additional discovery channel, not a replacement for your own promotion. How many new participants it actually brings depends on how appealing the activity is, and it is never guaranteed.
What the Catalog Is#
The catalog is the "Play" section of the Re:Activity mini app, at /play/catalog. It lists active public activities from different organizers, open to everyone. From the participant's point of view this is covered in How to find and open an activity.
Conditions for Appearing in the Catalog#
An activity appears in the catalog only if all of the following are true at the same time:
- The "Show in participant catalog" checkbox is enabled in the activity settings
- The activity is not archived
- The activity is in Active status
- The activity has both a channel and an activity type selected
- The activity owner has an active subscription to a paid plan
If even one condition isn't met, the activity won't show up in the catalog, even with the checkbox enabled.
The Most Common Reason "the Catalog Is Empty"#
The paid plan requirement isn't a formality. The free Starter plan does not qualify: even with the checkbox enabled and the activity fully set up, it won't appear in the catalog until a subscription to at least the Advanced plan or higher is active.
See Free Plan and Paid Plans for more on plans.
How to Enable Catalog Display#
The "Show in participant catalog" checkbox is on the first tab of the activity creation/editing form, in the options block next to pinning the post. For more on the form itself, see Creating an activity.
If the catalog conditions aren't met, the checkbox is disabled, and text underneath it explains exactly what's missing: no active subscription, the current plan is free, no channel selected, or no activity type selected. This prevents a situation where the checkbox is turned on "into thin air" and the organizer expects an effect that will never happen.
Publishing in the participant channels#
The "Show in participant catalog" checkbox does one more thing - as soon as the activity becomes active, it is also published as a separate post in the Re:Activity channels for participants (see Where to find other giveaways). The conditions are the same as for the catalog, plus one extra: the post in your own channel must already be published - there is nothing to repost without it.
Publishing is not instant: the post in our channels appears a few minutes after the activity launches, not the moment you press "Launch." For activities in English, the post only goes to the English Telegram channel - it does not go to the Russian-language channels or to VK/MAX.
Scheduled Activities#
If an activity is created with a delayed launch (status Scheduled) and the catalog checkbox is enabled, no extra steps are needed. Once the launch date arrives, a background service switches the activity to Active status - it polls every 30 seconds and doesn't reset the checkbox. As soon as the activity becomes active, it's picked up the next time the catalog is opened.
Catalog Visibility Is Live#
The catalog list isn't cached and isn't stored as a separate field - it's built from a database query on every page view. This means:
- Connect a paid plan while the checkbox is enabled, and the activity appears in the catalog immediately, the very first time the "Play" page is opened
- The subscription ends, is paused, or expires, and the activity disappears from the catalog just as immediately
The activity itself keeps working normally via its direct link the whole time: participants, conditions, prizes, and results are not affected in any way - only the catalog listing disappears.
One timing nuance: if a subscription fails because of an unsuccessful charge, this is handled by a daily background process that runs at 00:00 UTC. In that case, the moment the activity disappears from the catalog is tied to that run, not instant at the moment the charge fails.
