WhatsApp connects via Meta’s real WhatsApp Business Platform (Cloud API) — no manual credential copying required.
Connecting
Section titled “Connecting”Under Settings → Channels, click Connect with Facebook. This opens Meta’s own guided setup (Embedded Signup) where you log in with Facebook, pick or create a WhatsApp Business Account, and grant access — the phone number, access token, and webhook subscription are all set up automatically. There’s no Callback URL to paste anywhere yourself.
During that flow, Meta asks one important question if the number you’re connecting already has the WhatsApp Business App installed on a phone:
Coexistence: keep using your phone, add this inbox
Section titled “Coexistence: keep using your phone, add this inbox”If you choose to keep using the WhatsApp Business App, your number runs in Coexistence mode — both stay fully active on the same number, at the same time:
- The WhatsApp Business App on your phone keeps working exactly as before. Nothing about how your team uses it changes.
- This inbox also receives and can send messages on that same number.
- Past chat history and your phone’s contact list sync in automatically, usually within a few minutes of connecting — you don’t start with an empty inbox.
- Any message sent from the phone app itself shows up here too, so this inbox stays a complete, accurate record of the whole conversation regardless of which side replied.
A channel connected this way shows a Coexistence badge on its card in Settings → Channels, and the specific benefits above are always what’s on. If you’d rather move fully onto this inbox and stop using the phone app, choose the standard (non-Coexistence) option instead during setup.
If a number doesn’t have the Business App installed at all, Embedded Signup connects it as a normal, inbox-only WhatsApp number — same as before, no phone app involved.
The 24-hour reply window
Section titled “The 24-hour reply window”WhatsApp’s own rule, not something this inbox adds: once more than 24 hours have passed since the customer’s last message, you can no longer send a plain reply — only a pre-approved message template (below). A banner appears in the thread once you’re outside that window, and Send disables itself rather than letting you try and fail.
Message templates
Section titled “Message templates”Under the channel’s WhatsApp message templates manager: create a template with a name, category (Marketing, Utility, or Authentication — Meta’s own categories, each billed and reviewed differently), language, body text (with {{1}}, {{2}}-style variables and real example values for Meta’s review), and an optional footer. Templates go through Meta’s own approval before they’re usable, and are the only way to message a customer outside the 24-hour window.
Business profile
Section titled “Business profile”Under Edit business profile: your public-facing About text, description, address, email, one or more websites, and your business category (used by Meta and shown to customers viewing your WhatsApp profile). The profile photo isn’t editable from here yet — set it in Meta’s own WhatsApp Manager instead.
Broadcasts
Section titled “Broadcasts”Send a message-template broadcast to your known WhatsApp contacts, or everyone carrying a specific tag, from the Broadcast tool — same idea as LINE’s Broadcast, using an approved template since a broadcast is always outside the 24-hour window for at least some recipients. A real recipient count shows before you send, and only one broadcast can be sending on a given number at a time.
Insights
Section titled “Insights”The channel’s own Insights tab shows real analytics pulled from Meta’s WABA Analytics and Conversation Analytics APIs: a sent/delivered message chart over the last 7, 30, or 90 days, and a conversations-and-cost breakdown by category so you can see what you’re actually being billed for.