WhatsApp Business API: What It Is and How It Is Charged

The free app and the platform are different things

• WhatsApp Business app: free, on a phone, used by people. It has greeting and away messages, but no real automation.
• WhatsApp Business Platform (the API): used by software, such as a chatbot or your CRM. Meta offers it directly as the Cloud API, and through providers. Meta charges per message.

Meta's message categories

Meta sorts business messages into categories, and each category has its own price:

• Marketing: offers, announcements and invitations.
• Utility: updates about something the customer started, such as an order or a booking.
• Authentication: one-time codes for logging in.
• Service: replies to a customer who messaged you, inside the 24-hour window.

The 24-hour window

When a customer messages you, a 24-hour customer service window opens. Inside it, you can reply freely. Outside it, you can only send message templates that Meta has approved, to customers who agreed to receive them.

Conversations that start from a Click to WhatsApp ad have a free entry point window under Meta's rules, which is worth knowing if you advertise on Facebook or Instagram.

How the price is worked out

Meta charges per message. The price depends on the category and on the recipient's country, and Egypt has its own rates on Meta's rate card. Meta changes its pricing from time to time, so always check Meta's pricing page for the current rates. These charges are separate from what you pay anyone to build a chatbot.