Getting Started with WhatsApp Bot Platform

Before you begin, make sure you have an active WhatsApp Business account and access to the WhatsApp Bot Platform admin dashboard. You will also need a phone number that is not already registered with WhatsApp Web.

If you are on the Free plan you can create one instance. Paid plans allow multiple instances per tenant, which is useful for separating departments or brands.

Log in to the dashboard and navigate to Instances in the left sidebar. Click the 'New Instance' button and give it a friendly name — for example, 'Customer Support'. The platform will provision a WhatsApp gateway slot and display a QR code.

Open WhatsApp on your phone, go to Settings → Linked Devices → Link a Device, and scan the QR code shown on screen. Within a few seconds the status indicator turns green and your instance is live.

Head to the instance settings and expand the LLM Configuration panel. Select your provider (OpenAI or Anthropic), paste your API key, and choose a model. For most support use-cases, gpt-4o-mini or claude-haiku-3-5 offer the best cost-to-quality ratio.

Set a concise System Prompt that describes your bot's role, tone, and limitations. For example: 'You are a friendly customer support agent for Acme Co. Answer questions about orders, returns, and shipping. If you cannot help, say so and offer to connect the user with a human agent.'

Send a WhatsApp message to your linked number from any other phone. Within two to three seconds you should receive an AI-generated reply based on your system prompt. The conversation also appears in real time in the Conversations view on the dashboard.

Congratulations — your bot is live! Next steps: explore the Flow Engine to create keyword-triggered sequences, or connect a CRM via an MCP Server to give your bot access to live customer data.