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A WhatsApp chat agent answers inbound messages on one of your WhatsApp Business numbers. This is the fullest version of a chat agent — templates, media, calls and follow-ups are all WhatsApp features.

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Before you start

1

A connected WhatsApp Business account

See WhatsApp signup.
2

A registered phone number

Only CLOUD_API numbers can have a chat agent assigned. If your number shows “Register via Actions” in the table, register it first.
3

A saved chat agent

Built and saved, ideally with a published version. See Create a chat agent.

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Assign the agent to a number

1

Open the numbers table

Dashboard → WhatsApp → Phone Numbers.
2

Click the WhatsApp Agent cell

Find your number and click its WhatsApp Agent cell.
3

Pick the agent and save

Select your chat agent and save.
You can also do this from the other end: the WhatsApp Phone Number column in the Chat Agents table opens the same assignment.
One agent per number. Each WhatsApp number has a single inbound chat agent. To run different agents for different products, use different numbers.
From that point on, every inbound message to that number is handled by the agent’s published version.

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Per-contact assignment

Besides the number-wide assignment, an individual contact can be attached to a specific chat agent — for example when a voice call ends and the contact is handed to a chat agent to continue on WhatsApp. Those explicit assignments are visible in their effect, and can be removed from the Inbox with De-assign, which clears the assignment for that contact on that number without deleting any messages.

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The 24-hour rule

WhatsApp only allows free-form messages inside a 24-hour window that opens when the customer messages you. Outside it, only approved templates may be sent. This shapes what a chat agent can do:
This is why the follow-up gap and the 24-hour window interact: a follow-up an hour later is inside the window and can be a normal message; one the next day is not.

WhatsApp phone numbers

Registering numbers and assigning agents

Templates

What the agent sends outside the window

Inbox

Watching live conversations

Campaigns

Starting conversations at scale