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Your customers already message you on WhatsApp. A chatbot can answer them at night, look up an order, handle the questions that come back every day and hand over to an agent when needed. But everything it sends goes through Meta’s platform, which decides what it may send, when, at what price and with which AI. The terms were updated on 23 September 2026, and billing changed on 1 October. This guide from our Automation and bots section takes stock before you plug anything in.
In short
A chatbot runs on the WhatsApp Business Platform, accessed through an API. The WhatsApp Business app is for answering yourself, not for connecting a bot.
The bot replies freely within 24 hours of the customer’s last message. Beyond that, it can only send approved templates, to people who have opted in.
Since 1 October 2026, Meta bills customer service replies again beyond 1,000 a month per number. Messages your customers send you are never billed.
An AI can answer your customers. General-purpose AI assistants, however, are only allowed where the law requires Meta to accept them, and your AI provider cannot train its models on your conversations.
Customers must be able to reach a person, and any request to stop must be honoured, whether it arrives on WhatsApp or elsewhere.
App or platform: which one for a chatbot?
WhatsApp Business comes in two forms, and only one can host a chatbot. The WhatsApp Business app, designed for small shops, automates the greeting, not the conversation: after the welcome message, you are the one replying. The WhatsApp Business Platform is the API access for businesses, direct or through a provider: it is the one that connects to your tools and hosts a bot.
The WhatsApp Business app
You reply yourself, by hand
Automatic greeting and away messages
A product catalogue
The WhatsApp Business Platform
API access, direct or through a provider
Connected to your CRM and your tools
Approved templates, automated flows, AI
A number already used in the app can also be used on the platform, without changing it: you keep replying from the app in your one-to-one chats, but Meta’s documentation warns that broadcast lists are then disabled and group chats are not synchronised. This connection goes through a Meta partner.
To connect the platform to your tools, an orchestrator such as n8n offers a WhatsApp Business Cloud node: it sends a message or a template, and can also ask a question and wait for the customer’s answer before carrying on. Its trigger receives incoming messages, with one limit to know about: each app created at Meta for WhatsApp accepts only one webhook, the address where messages arrive. If another tool already receives yours, you have to choose which one handles them. For choosing the orchestrator itself, see n8n, Make or Zapier for a small business.
What can a bot do within the 24-hour window?
Everything revolves around a window. Each customer message opens a 24-hour window, and each new message resets it. While it is open, the bot can reply however it likes, without a template. Once it closes, it can only send message templates: texts prepared in advance, approved, and filed by Meta into a category.
What a bot can send, and when
- The customer writes
A 24-hour window opens.
- The bot replies without a template
Free text, information pulled from your tools, a question to clarify the request.
- A person takes over
As soon as the request goes beyond the bot, an agent replies in the same conversation.
- The window closes
24 hours without a customer message, and free conversation stops.
- A template, only to people who opted in
A confirmation, a code or a reminder, sent to someone who has given consent.
Templates fall into three categories, which Meta’s pricing page illustrates as follows: an abandoned cart reminder is a marketing message, an order confirmation a utility message, and a message used to verify an identity, such as a code, an authentication message. The category matters, because it sets the price.
Consent, for its part, is collected before the first message. The WhatsApp Business Messaging Policy requires you to have the person’s number and their consent to receive your messages. A list of numbers bought or gathered elsewhere does not count as consent.
What Meta charges since 1 October 2026
Since 1 July 2025, Meta bills per delivered message, not per sent message, according to its category and the recipient’s country, deduced from the dialling code of their number. Messages your customers send you are never billed.
On 1 October 2026, Meta started billing customer service replies again, those the bot or your agents send without a template within the 24-hour window:
- The first 1,000 replies of the month are not billed, for each number. The allowance resets every month, and anything unused does not carry over.
- From the 1,001st onwards, each reply is billed, depending on the customer’s country.
- Without a payment method on file, Meta stops delivering these replies once the allowance is used up. A bot that ran perfectly in September can therefore go silent in the middle of the month.
Templates, on the other hand, are billed every time they are sent, including during an open conversation: in Meta’s example, an order confirmation sent mid-conversation is billed.
Only two cases remain where Meta charges nothing. The first is this allowance of 1,000 replies. The second is the non-billed entry point window: when a customer writes from an ad that clicks through to WhatsApp, on the Android or iOS app, and you reply within 24 hours, a window opens that can last up to seven days, during which neither your replies nor your templates are billed. One exception: the AI agent Meta sells for answering customers, billed separately according to the volume of text processed, including within that window.
For budgeting, Meta only changes its prices on the first day of a quarter, with at least one month’s notice for a new rate card and six months’ notice for a change of billing model.
Does a WhatsApp chatbot need AI?
Not always. An order status, opening hours, a tracking link or collecting contact details can be handled with rules: the bot recognises the request, looks up the information in your tools and replies. That is the idea behind our guide on automation without AI: AI is justified when the customer writes freely and you need to understand what they are asking. For how to split the work between rules, AI and agents, see Automating customer support: AI sorts, humans review.
When an AI answers, it must say so. Since 2 August 2026, the European AI Act requires that a person knows, from the first exchange, that they are talking to an AI system, unless it is obvious. The details are in AI Act and GDPR: what a small business using AI must do.
What Meta forbids AI assistants
The platform terms devote an entire section to AI: section 4.7 of the Meta Terms for WhatsApp Business Platform, in their version of 23 September 2026. It distinguishes two cases.
Watch out
Meta restricts general-purpose AI assistants, not the AI that runs your customer service
An AI provider whose AI is the primary function, rather than an incidental one, may not use the platform, directly or indirectly, and Meta is the one who decides. You may, however, entrust your customer service to an AI provider. That provider then cannot use your conversations to create, train or improve its models, except to fine-tune a model reserved for your use alone. Check that its contract says so.
This ban has an exception: Meta’s page on AI providers allows these assistants where the law requires it to accept them, and the list of countries concerned changed several times in 2026. Read it again before choosing a provider.
Consent, opting out and handing over to a human
The WhatsApp Business policy adds three rules that apply to any bot, with or without AI.
- Consent first. You only message people whose number you have and who have agreed to receive your messages.
- Opt-outs always honoured. A person who asks to stop receiving your messages must be heard, whether they say so on WhatsApp or elsewhere.
- A reachable person. Automation is allowed for replying within the 24-hour window, provided you offer a quick, clear and direct way to reach someone: an agent in the conversation, a phone number, an email address, a form or a shop.
The handover to an agent should therefore be planned from day one, along with what the bot passes on: a summary of the request, the identified customer, what has already been answered. A customer who has to explain everything again to the person taking over has wasted their time twice.
Where to start
A useful WhatsApp chatbot starts small.
- List the questions.
For two weeks, note what your customers ask on WhatsApp and how many messages arrive: that figure tells you whether the 1,000-reply allowance is enough.
- Choose what the bot handles.
The three or four most frequent questions, each with an answer pulled from your tools.
- Plan the handover.
Who takes over, at what times, and what the bot passes on.
- Prepare the templates.
Only the ones you will need outside the 24-hour window, for people who have opted in.
From the field
Anything binding goes through a person
Our expense-entry agent has been running on Telegram in production since July 2026: it starts from a photo of the receipt, extracts the information, then waits for human approval before writing to the accounting system. On WhatsApp, the same rule applies to anything that commits the business, a refund or a cancellation: the bot prepares, a person approves.
Our Telegram or WhatsApp business bot sets up this flow, connected to your CRM, with AI replies as an option. If the bot is just one piece of a larger whole, process automation with n8n connects it to the rest of your tools. Before starting, we check with you, in 20 minutes, that it is the right project. If it is not, we tell you.
Frequently asked questions
Can you build a chatbot with the WhatsApp Business app?
No. The app, designed for small shops, sends automatic greeting and away messages, but you are the one who replies afterwards. A chatbot that understands the question, looks up the information in your tools and replies runs on the WhatsApp Business Platform, meaning Meta’s API, directly or through a provider, with an orchestrator such as n8n to tie everything together.
How much does a WhatsApp Business chatbot cost?
Two items add up: the setup, and what Meta charges for usage. Since 1 October 2026, replies sent within the 24-hour window are billed beyond 1,000 a month per number, and each message template is billed according to its category and the customer’s country. If the bot uses AI, its cost comes on top, depending on the model chosen.
Can a WhatsApp chatbot message a customer first?
Yes, but only with a message template, and only to a person who has agreed to receive your messages. Outside the 24-hour window opened by the customer’s last message, free text is impossible. A sales follow-up goes through a marketing template, an order confirmation through a utility template, each billed according to its category.
Can you connect AI to a WhatsApp chatbot?
Yes, to answer your customers: Meta allows you to entrust your customer service to an AI provider. What it forbids are general-purpose AI assistants, where the AI is the product itself, except where the law requires it to accept them. Your provider also cannot train its models on your conversations, except for a model reserved for your use. And the bot must tell your customers they are talking to an AI.
Sources
- WhatsApp Business App (new tab)whatsappbusiness.com
- WhatsApp Business Platform (new tab)whatsappbusiness.com
- Onboard WhatsApp Business app users (new tab)developers.facebook.com
- WhatsApp Business Cloud node, n8n documentation (new tab)docs.n8n.io
- WhatsApp Trigger node, n8n documentation (new tab)docs.n8n.io
- Pricing on the WhatsApp Business Platform (new tab)developers.facebook.com
- WhatsApp Business Messaging Policy (new tab)whatsappbusiness.com
- Meta Terms for WhatsApp Business Platform (new tab)facebook.com
- AI Providers, WhatsApp Business Platform (new tab)developers.facebook.com
Jim · founder of Brain Plus AI
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