Send WhatsApp Notification Messages with Templates
A WhatsApp message template is a message format that you can use over and over again to message users once they have opted-in and given your app permission to send them messages. To use a message template, you must first submit it to WhatsApp. Meta reviews and approves each message template to maintain high-quality content and avoid spam. Once WhatsApp has approved your template, you can use the message template to send notifications. For more info on WhatsApp's template approval process, please refer to this article.
Templates use placeholder values that can be replaced with dynamic content inside double curly braces ({{...}}) when the message is sent:
-
Your appointment for {{1}} is scheduled for {{2}}. Need to reschedule? Tap below to reply. - Example of a message sent using this template: Your appointment for your doctor's appointment is scheduled for Tuesday at 10AM. Need to reschedule? Tap below to reply.
- Note that a single placeholder can contain multiple words.
Think of your template message as a conversation starter; the goal is to convert this initial message into a two-way conversation when the user replies. Two-way conversations are considered higher value because you are engaging with your end-user. In addition, they reduce your spend because WhatsApp does not charge for free-form outbound messages within the 24-hour session. For more information on pricing, please see our pricing page.
If a WhatsApp user has sent your application a message — whether it's a reply to one of your outbound messages, or they have initiated communication themselves — your application has a 24-hour window (sometimes called a "24-hour session") to send that user messages that don't need to use a template.
When your application sends a message to a WhatsApp user outside a 24-hour session, the message must use an approved template.
Starting June 1, 2023, WhatsApp maintains separate 24-hour windows depending on the category of the template used to start the conversation. For example, if you already opened a 24-hour window using one template category, then a template of a different category would open up a second, separate 24-hour window.
Twilio has pre-provisioned for the following templates for use in the WhatsApp Sandbox:
-
Your {{1}} appointment is coming up on {{2}}. Get ready! -
Your {{1}} order of {{2}} has shipped and should be delivered on {{3}}. Details : {{4}}. Let us know if you have any questions.
For more information, read our guide to getting started with the Twilio Sandbox for WhatsApp.
Your WhatsApp message templates must fall into one of the following categories. Please note that the categories "One-time password" and "Transactional" have been renamed to "Authentication" and "Utility", respectively.
- Authentication: Authenticate users with one-time passcodes. The body text is determined by Meta cannot be changed.
- Utility: Share important information related to a specific, agreed-upon transaction and accomplish one of the following: confirm, suspend, or change a transaction or subscription.
- Marketing: Send promotional offers, product announcements, and more to increase awareness and engagement. Any template that has a mix of utility and marketing content will be classified by Meta as a marketing template.
As of June 1, 2023, Meta's fees for business-initiated conversations is now defined by the category of the template used to start the conversation. Any templates that do not clearly result from an explicit end-user request will likely be categorized by Meta as "Marketing". Learn more in our pricing page. Please refer to Meta's docs for examples and the latest details on Meta's template categorization rules. Meta determines template categories at their sole discretion.
Customers interested in sending notifications outside of the 24-hour window need to create their own templates for these messages.
Twilio currently offers two ways to manage and use templates: WhatsApp templates and Content Templates. Content Templates are message templates that can be used on any channel, including WhatsApp. They offer more flexibility, but require some additional setup before you can get started. To launch quickly, we recommend using WhatsApp Templates. This guide explains how to use WhatsApp Templates. As you are scaling your solution, we suggest considering integrating Content Templates into your workflow. Learn more about Content templates here.
| Content Templates | WhatsApp Templates | |
|---|---|---|
| Supported channels | WhatsApp, SMS, MMS, Facebook Messenger | |
| Sending messages | Sending requires use of a ContentSid field | Use the Body field to send |
| Messaging Service | Required | Optional |
| Rich feature support | Latest rich features support by Twilio, such as lists, media templates and dynamic buttons | Static quick replies and CTA buttons only |
| API to manage templates | Content API | N/A |
| UI to manage templates | Content Editor In the Twilio Console, go to Messaging > Content Editor | WhatsApp Templates In the Twilio Console, go to Messaging > Senders > WhatsApp Templates |
To create a WhatsApp template, go to Twilio Console > Messaging > Senders > WhatsApp Templates. Click on Submit a message template:
_10Hi {{1}}! Thanks for placing an order with us. We'll let you know once your order has been processed and delivered. Your order number is {{2}}. Thanks
in the Body parameter of the message resource, you would write the following, replacing the {{1}} placeholder with the end-user's information:
_10Body=“Hi Joe! Thanks for placing an order with us. We'll let you know once your order has been processed and delivered. Your order number is O12235234. Thanks”
Twilio also supports sending template messages by referencing the template ID. This is available through Twilio's omnichannel Content Templates (Beta).
Twilio's Error 63016 indicates that you are making an attempt to send a freeform message when there's no conversation set with that user. This may happen if your text does not exactly match the text from the approved template. Please make sure that you use a diff tool to check for any differences between the approved template and the content being sent, including extra spaces or newlines. If you need to change the template to match your needs, please submit a new template. If you are seeing a different error code and you believe it is related to templates, please open a support ticket, and we will help you understand why this is happening.
If you are rendering new lines or other escaped characters, you will need to encode the linebreaks properly based on the language you are using. The Twilio Console may show line breaks and other escaped characters in their raw form, such as \n. However, if your message body shown on Twilio has "\n" visible in the body contents, you need to check your code to ensure you pass an actual line break character to Twilio.
For example, here's a message template with line breaks:
_10Hello! This is a notification message from [Your Company].\nWe wanted to inform you about an important update:\n[Message Content].\nThank you!
If you are using cURL, you will need to use the following syntax, $'Body=Hello \n world!' with single quotes ($'...') to send newlines. Here is a full example:
_10curl -X POST https://api.twilio.com/2010-04-01/Accounts/ACXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX/Messages.json \_10--data-urlencode 'To=whatsapp:+15005550006' \_10--data-urlencode 'From=whatsapp:+14155238886' \_10--data-urlencode $'Body=Hi, there.\nWelcome to ALVIN instant servicing.\n\nKindly provide your reference number to proceed' \_10-u ACXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX:your_auth_token
As a developer, you may want to send different types of notifications and messages to your users. However, it's difficult and inefficient to go through the template approval process described above for every type of message that you wish to send to your end-users.
For example, let's say you want to send out a time-sensitive message to all of your end-users, such as "Today, we are having a company-wide announcement at 11am." It is unlikely that WhatsApp will approve this template, which makes it challenging to build a real notification flow.
To work around this problem, you can create a generic template that asks your end-users to respond. An example of generic notification template that you can submit for approval is:
"Hello {{1}}, we have a new update regarding your account. Please respond to this message to receive it. Have a nice day!"
Once an end-user replies to this templated message, it initiates the 24-hour session, during which your business can send free-form messages.
Once you start using your templates, it's important to monitor them for excessive negative user feedback.
If end users are repeatedly giving blocking or reporting spam in association with a message template, WhatsApp will pause the template for a period of time to protect the quality rating of senders that have used the template. Pausing durations are as follows:
- 1st Instance: Paused for 3 hours
- 2nd Instance: Paused for 6 hours
- 3rd Instance: Disabled
When a template is paused a third time it will instead be permanently disabled. Messages sent using paused or disabled templates will fail. Paused and disabled message templates that are attempted to be sent do not count against the daily messaging limit.
Twilio can send a notification using Twilio Alerts when a template status changes to "paused", "disabled" or "rejected". To get notified, create an alert for error 63041 (paused), 63042 (disabled) and/or 63040 (rejected).
You may send URLs in a template, e.g., "Thanks for registering with My Business. To continue click on https://app.example.com".
WhatsApp does not currently support URL previews in templated messages. URL previews are supported in in-session messages.
Ready to create your own WhatsApp templates? Head over to the Twilio Console to get started.