Sending & Receiving Messages

Before a business is allowed to send notification messages to their consumers on WhatsApp, they must first receive consent from the consumer to communicate with them on this channel via an explicit opt-in process.

On July 9th, 2020, WhatsApp updated its business policy to make it easier and simpler for brands to obtain opt-in from their consumers for the WhatsApp channel. Brands are no longer required to obtain opt-in via a third-party channel like SMS or email, but can now also obtain opt-in within the WhatsApp thread itself or by using an interactive voice response (IVR).

WhatsApp still expects clarity on requests for opt-in, brand name usage, and compliance with local and all applicable laws.

Please take special note of the following:

• Businesses must clearly state that a person is opting in to receive messages from the business over WhatsApp.

• Businesses must clearly state the name of the business that a person is opting to receive messages from.

• Businesses must comply with all applicable laws.

• While the updated policy is more flexible, businesses should continue to optimize for the user experience when obtaining opt-in, e.g.:

  • Explicitly call out the types of messages a customer is opting into (e.g., delivery updates).

  • Avoid messaging customers too frequently.

  • Provide instructions for how customers can opt out and honor these requests.

Sending media via WhatsApp

Businesses are limited to submitting 20MB per message/payload (this can include multiple media files per message). Clickatell will compress the media when required to ensure successful hand-off to the WhatsApp server for delivery.

Clickatell limits the number of uploads allowed on a particular account per 24-hour period. The main purpose of this is to prevent abuse on an account level. To increase the media upload limit, please reach out to your account manager or log a ticket with support to review this request.

Receiving media via WhatsApp

For receiving media, WhatsApp supports the following limits per media type:

Images: 5MB
Documents: 64MB
Audio: 16MB

Clickatell is bound to comply with WhatsApp server requirements and to ensure that all media callbacks are within the limits stated above when delivering to the business.

Also see:

• Which message types and media formats are supported by the WhatsApp Business Platform?

• What messaging limits apply to my WhatsApp Business account?

WhatsApp makes use of the UTF-8 character set and any characters within this set are supported. Being a richer messaging platform, additional formatting and media types are also supported over and above plain text. A maximum of 4096 characters can be sent at a time and messages that are longer will be truncated.

Rich text can include hyperlinks and formatting such as bold, italics, strike-through, code formatting, line breaks, and emojis.

Various media formats are also supported. These include the following popular formats:

Images – JPEG, PNG

Documents – PDF, MS Word, MS Powerpoint, MS Excel, plain text

Audio – ACC, MP4, AMR, MPEG, OGG, codec = OPUS

Video - MP4 (with H.264 video codec and AAC audio codec)