The WhatsApp channel connects a WhatsApp Business number to Gruvi. Customers message the number the way they message anyone, and the conversation arrives in your inbox.
What the WhatsApp channel is
It is a phone number people can write to on WhatsApp. Not a personal WhatsApp account, but a WhatsApp Business number. That is the version Meta provides for companies.
For a lot of customers, particularly outside the English-speaking world, WhatsApp is how they contact a business. If your customers are already asking for a WhatsApp number, that is the signal to turn this on.
Before you start
WhatsApp is the most involved of the four channels, because Meta controls the account rather than us.
- A Meta business portfolio, with admin access. Being a user on the account is not enough.
- A phone number for WhatsApp Business. Either one already on your Meta account, or one you add during setup.
- A few minutes, and the Facebook login for that business account to hand.
How to set it up
- 1Go to Settings, then Channels, then WhatsApp.
- 2Click Connect WhatsApp.
- 3Sign in with Facebook and approve Gruvi's access in the Meta popup that appears.
- 4Choose the WhatsApp number your customers will message, or add a new one.
- 5Send yourself a test message on WhatsApp and confirm it lands in your Gruvi inbox.
What Meta charges from 1 October 2026
Until 30 September 2026, answering customers on WhatsApp costs nothing. From 1 October 2026 Meta starts charging for the messages you send. Four things decide what you pay.
- Only what you send is charged
- Messages your customers send you are free, and always have been. Meta charges when it delivers a message from you to them.
- The first 1,000 each month are free
- Every WhatsApp number gets 1,000 free replies a month. Meta only charges from the 1,001st. The allowance resets on the 1st and unused messages do not carry over.
- After that it is $0.0034 a message
- That is Meta's rate for a number in the United States or Canada. Rates differ by country and Meta can change them once a quarter, so check your own.
- Chloe's replies cost the same as a person's
- A reply written by Chloe is charged at the same rate as one typed by your team. Meta charges for delivering the message, not for the writing of it.
So a number handling 1,000 messages a month, in and out, pays nothing. Only half of those are yours to send, and the free allowance covers them easily. A number that sends 2,000 replies a month pays for 1,000 of them, which is $3.40.
Limitations and things to watch
- Meta owns the rules. WhatsApp has its own restrictions on what businesses may send and when, particularly for messages you start rather than reply to. Those rules are Meta's, not ours, and they change.
- The number is not reusable elsewhere. Once it is a WhatsApp Business number connected to Gruvi, treat it as belonging to support.
- Customers expect chat speed, not email speed. WhatsApp feels instant to the person using it. Decide who is watching before you publish the number.
- Publish it deliberately. Once a number is out there you cannot take it back. Put it where you want the volume, not everywhere at once.