Straight answers about WhatsApp for business

What is the WhatsApp 24-hour window?

The 24-hour window is the period after a customer messages your business during which you can reply with free-form messages. It opens each time the customer sends you a message and closes 24 hours after their most recent one. Outside it, you can only send a template Meta has approved.

What is a WhatsApp message template and why does it need approval?

A WhatsApp message template is a pre-written message, reviewed and approved by Meta before you can send it, that lets a business start a conversation outside the 24-hour window. Templates contain placeholders you fill in per recipient, so one approved template serves every customer.

What is the WhatsApp quality rating and how do I keep it green?

The quality rating is Meta's score for how recipients react to messages from your number, shown as green, yellow or red. It is driven mainly by blocks and reports. A falling rating reduces how many people you can message per day, and a red rating can restrict the number entirely.

Do customers need to opt in before I message them on WhatsApp?

Yes. Meta requires that people have opted in before a business sends them template messages, and separately your local privacy law may require its own consent. Opt-in can be collected anywhere — a form, a checkout, a website widget, or the customer messaging you first — but you must be able to show it was given.

What is the difference between the WhatsApp Business app and the API?

The WhatsApp Business app is a free phone app for one person managing one number. The Cloud API is an interface other software connects to, so a team can share one number, automate replies and message at scale. The app has an interface; the API does not — you use it through a platform.

How do I get the green tick on WhatsApp?

The green tick marks an Official Business Account, granted by Meta to brands it considers notable. It is not something you buy or unlock by verifying your business — Meta decides, largely on whether the brand has meaningful third-party press coverage. Most businesses will not get one, and it changes nothing about what you can send.

What are WhatsApp messaging limits and how do you increase them?

A messaging limit is the number of unique customers your business number can start a conversation with in a rolling 24 hours. It applies only to conversations you initiate — replies inside an open customer service window are not counted and are never capped. Numbers start on the lowest tier and move up automatically as you send more without your quality rating falling.

Why was my WhatsApp template rejected?

Most rejections come from one of four things: the template does not match the category it was submitted under, it contains a variable with no sample or a variable doing work the text should do, it reads as promotional while claiming to be a utility message, or it breaks a formatting rule such as starting or ending with a variable. Meta returns a reason with the rejection, and fixing the text is faster than appealing it.

What is the difference between a WhatsApp broadcast and a group?

A broadcast sends the same message to many people as separate one-to-one chats: nobody sees the other recipients, and replies come back privately to you. A group puts everyone into one shared conversation where all members see each other’s numbers and every reply. For messaging customers, a broadcast is almost always what you want and a group almost never is.

What is a WhatsApp broadcast?

A WhatsApp broadcast sends one message to many people as separate one-to-one chats. Each person receives what looks like an ordinary private message, no recipient can see who else was sent it, and every reply returns to you privately. On the consumer app a broadcast reaches only those who have your number saved in their phone; on the WhatsApp Business Platform that condition does not exist.

How many people can a WhatsApp broadcast reach?

A broadcast list in the WhatsApp or WhatsApp Business app holds up to 256 contacts, and only those who have saved your number receive what you send to it. On the WhatsApp Business Platform neither restriction exists. What bounds you there is your messaging limit: how many distinct people you may open a conversation with in a rolling 24 hours, a figure Meta raises or lowers based on your quality rating and how you send.

What is a WhatsApp broadcast list, and how do you create one?

A broadcast list is a saved set of contacts inside the WhatsApp or WhatsApp Business app that you can message together, with each person receiving a separate private chat rather than a shared thread. It holds up to 256 contacts, lives on the device that created it, and delivers only to recipients who have your number in their address book.

How do you send a broadcast message on WhatsApp?

In the WhatsApp Business app you create a broadcast list, choose up to 256 contacts, and send to it — each recipient gets a private message, and anyone who has not saved your number receives nothing. On the WhatsApp Business Platform you send to a segment of your own contact list using a template Meta has approved, and the saved-contact condition does not apply.

How does WhatsApp Business API pricing work?

Meta charges the business, not the customer, and the price depends on the category of what you send and the country of the number you send it to. Categories carry different rates because they carry different value: marketing costs more than utility or authentication. Customer-initiated conversations — where someone messages you first and you reply — are the cheapest case, and replying inside the service window has been free under every version of the pricing model so far.

What is the difference between the WhatsApp Cloud API and the On-Premises API?

The Cloud API is hosted by Meta: you call their endpoint and they run the infrastructure. The On-Premises API was a container you hosted and maintained yourself. New integrations use the Cloud API — it is free to access, receives features first, and removes the hosting work — and Meta has been retiring the On-Premises version.

What phone number can you use for the WhatsApp Business API?

You need a number you control, that can receive a verification code by SMS or voice call, and that is not currently active on the WhatsApp consumer app or the WhatsApp Business app. A landline works as long as it can take the verification call. Once a number is registered to the Business Platform it can no longer be used in either phone app.

What are WhatsApp template categories, and how do you choose the right one?

Meta sorts every message template into one of three categories: Marketing, Utility or Authentication. The category is decided by what the message does for the recipient, not by what you call it, and it determines both what you are charged and how strictly the template is reviewed. Marketing is the broadest and most expensive; Utility covers messages about a transaction the customer already entered into; Authentication is for one-time passcodes only.

What is Meta Business Verification and do you need it for WhatsApp?

Business verification is Meta confirming your business is a real legal entity, using documents like a certificate of incorporation or a utility bill in the business name. It is separate from the green tick and from your quality rating. You can start on the WhatsApp Business Platform without it, but you stay on the lowest messaging limits until it is done.

What happens when customers block or report your WhatsApp business number?

Blocks and reports are the main input to your quality rating. As that rating falls, Meta lowers your messaging limit — so the practical cost of annoying people is not lost goodwill, it is a hard cap on how many people you can reach at all. A number that keeps collecting them ends up restricted.

Can several people answer the same WhatsApp business number?

Not on the WhatsApp Business app in any workable way — it is built around one phone, and linked devices mirror that phone rather than giving anyone their own account. On the WhatsApp Business Platform the number is not tied to a handset at all, so any number of agents can work it through a shared inbox, each with their own login.

How do WhatsApp click-to-chat links (wa.me) work?

A click-to-chat link opens a WhatsApp conversation with your number without the person having to save it as a contact. The format is https://wa.me/<number>, where the number is in full international form with no plus sign, spaces, brackets or dashes. Adding ?text= pre-fills a message they can edit before sending.

How do WhatsApp QR codes work for a business?

A WhatsApp QR code is a click-to-chat link in printable form. Scanning it opens a conversation with your number, optionally with a message pre-filled. It contains no data beyond that link, which is why any QR generator can make one from a wa.me URL.

What is a WhatsApp chatbot and how does it work?

A WhatsApp chatbot is software connected to the WhatsApp Business Platform that reads incoming messages and replies without a person. It cannot be built on the consumer or Business apps, which expose no interface for it — the Platform is the only route. What it may send is governed by the same rules a human agent works under: free-form replies within 24 hours of the customer’s last message, and an approved template outside that.

How do you set up an auto reply on WhatsApp?

Away messages and greeting messages are features of the WhatsApp Business app, configured on the phone. They do not exist on the WhatsApp Business Platform — there is no equivalent setting, because the Platform is an API and expects the software connected to it to decide what to reply. The behaviour is easy to reproduce, but you build it rather than switch it on.

What is the difference between WhatsApp labels and CRM tags?

Labels are a feature of the WhatsApp Business app: a small fixed number of coloured markers applied to chats on one phone. CRM tags are records in a database, unlimited, shared across a team, and usable as an audience for sending. Labels do not transfer when a number moves to the Business Platform.

What are WhatsApp Flows?

Flows are Meta’s way of putting a structured, form-like experience inside a WhatsApp chat — screens with inputs the customer fills in without leaving the conversation. They are built and hosted through Meta’s tooling, and they are a genuinely different thing from sending messages, which is why not every tool supports them.

Does WhatsApp Business need 10DLC registration?

No. A2P 10DLC registration governs application-to-person SMS and MMS sent to US numbers over the mobile carrier networks. WhatsApp messages travel over the internet to the WhatsApp app and never touch those networks, so registering a brand and campaign with The Campaign Registry does not apply to them. WhatsApp has its own gatekeeping instead: approved message templates, template categories, a quality rating on the number and messaging limits.

WhatsApp or SMS for business messaging?

SMS reaches any working mobile number and needs no app, but sending to US numbers requires carrier registration and is billed per message. WhatsApp reaches only people who use WhatsApp, needs no carrier registration, and requires a Meta-approved template to open a conversation outside a 24-hour reply window. Which is better depends on whether your customers use WhatsApp, not on which channel performs better in the abstract.