WhatsApp templates: message approval for outreach
Why WhatsApp templates exist
WhatsApp requires businesses to use pre-approved message templates when starting a new conversation with a customer or when sending a message to a customer after the standard 24-hour customer-service window has closed. Free-form messages cannot be sent in these situations.
The Templates page
You can manage your templates in the dashboard by navigating to Admin → Templates.
On this page, you can:
- Create templates: Design new message templates directly in the dashboard, including text, placeholders (variables), and optional buttons.
- Submit for review: When you create or update a template, it is automatically submitted to Meta for approval.
- Monitor status: Check the approval status of your templates:
- Pending: The template is currently under review by Meta.
- Approved: The template is ready to use for customer outreach.
- Rejected: Meta has declined the template. You will need to edit and resubmit it.
Categories
When creating a template, you must choose a category that matches its purpose:
- Marketing: Messages sent for promotional purposes, offers, updates, or invitations.
- Utility: Messages related to a specific transaction, account update, order notification, or customer action.
Variables
You can customize your templates by using variables (placeholders) such as {{1}} or {{2}}. These variables are automatically replaced with customer-specific details, such as their name or order number, when the message is sent.
Opt-out buttons
When creating a utility template, you can check Add opt-out button to append a quick-reply button (such as "Stop these updates") that lets the customer stop all future template messages with a single tap. Marketing templates don't get this button — customers manage marketing messages through WhatsApp's own "Offers and announcements" setting, which Yapper honors automatically (see contact-preferences).
Giving customers an easy way out is highly recommended: customers who can opt out easily are less likely to block or report your number, which protects your quality rating and sender standing.
Sending templates
You can send templates to one or many customers:
- Direct send: Select a contact in the Address book or on the Templates page to send an approved template immediately.
- Schedules and batches: You can schedule templates to be sent to a group of customers at a later time (for example, as follow-up batches). If a customer replies to you before a scheduled template is sent, or if they have opted out of receiving templates, the scheduled message will not be sent.
If your connected sender has been disabled or disconnected, template sending will fail. If a template message fails to deliver to specific recipients, the dashboard surfaces these failures under the individual batch details so you can review the error details and retry the send.