Per-message pricing is live and now applies to businesses for whom it is July 1, 2025 or later, based on their WABA timezone.

Pricing on the WhatsApp Business Platform

This document explains how pricing works on the WhatsApp Business Platform.

Cloud API and MM Lite API

To align with industry-standards, effective July 1, 2025, we now charge on a per-message basis:

We only charge when a template message is delivered ("type":"template").
Rates vary based on the template's category and the recipient WhatsApp phone number's country calling code.

We provide value to businesses in several ways:

All non-template messages are free ("type":"text", "type":"image", etc.). These can only be sent within an open customer service window. See Sending messages for a list of message types.
Utility templates delivered within an open customer service window are free.
You can unlock lower rates for utility and authentication template messages, based on messaging volume.
All messages are free for 72 hours, including template messages, if sent within an open free entry point window.

Our pricing explainer PDF outlines how we charge, and the various ways we provide value to businesses, in PDF form:

Pricing Explainer PDF

Message template categories

Unlike non-template messages, template messages are the only message type that can be sent outside of a customer service window. Templates can be categorized as:

Marketing
Utility
Authentication

See Template categorization to learn how template categorization works.

Template messages vs. non-template messages

			Is it billable?
Message type	Message category	When can it be sent?	Delivered outside CSW*	Delivered inside CSW*	Delivered inside FEP** window
Template messages	Marketing	Anytime	Yes	Yes	No
	Authentication	Anytime	Yes	Yes	No
	Utility	Anytime	Yes	No	No
Non-template (free-form) messages	Service	Only inside an open CSW*	N/A	No	No

* Customer service window
** Free entry point window

Businesses are responsible for reviewing the category assigned to their approved templates. Whenever a template is used, a business accepts the charges associated with the category applied to the template at time of use.

Charge example

In the example below, a business sends 4 messages to a WhatsApp user but is only charged for 2 (1 marketing charge, 1 utility charge).

Hour	Action	Rate	Reason
0	You send a marketing template message to a WhatsApp user, promoting your new product.	Marketing	All marketing template messages are charged.
2	The user messages you about the product. This opens a 24 hour customer service window ("CSW").	-	Messages sent from a WhatsApp user to a business are not charged.
3	You send a text message to the user (`"type":"text"`), describing the product in more detail.	None	All non-template messages are free within an open customer service window.
4	The user purchases the product and you send them a utility template confirming their order.	None	The CSW is still open, and utility templates sent within an open CSW are free.
26	The CSW closes, which means you can no longer send non-template messages.	-	24 hours have passed since the user last messaged you.
30	You send a utility template message to the user, updating them on their order.	Utility	Utility template messages sent outside of a CSW are charged, and no open CSW exists between you and the user.

Pricing calendar

To better enable our customers to plan and prepare for pricing updates, the following pricing calendar applies for messaging and voice on the WhatsApp Business Platform:

Meta may update pricing only on the 1st day of each quarter, thus up to 4 times per year: January 1, April 1, July 1, and/or October 1.
Meta will provide advanced notice that is better aligned to the effort required to implement different types of pricing updates, per below:

Type of pricing update	Examples	Minimum advance notice
Rate card update	Updating the rate for a given market–product Updating the volume tiers for a given market–product (utility and authentication only) Moving a market from one pricing region (e.g. “Other”) to another or to be standalone on the rate card	1 month
Pricing model add-on	Our July 1, 2025, introduction of new volume tiers for utility and authentication messages	3 months
Pricing model change	Our July 1, 2025 update to our pricing model, from conversation-based pricing to per-message pricing	6 months

Type of pricing update

Examples

Minimum advance notice

Rate card update

Updating the rate for a given market–product

Updating the volume tiers for a given market–product (utility and authentication only)

Moving a market from one pricing region (e.g. “Other”) to another or to be standalone on the rate card

1 month

Pricing model add-on

Our July 1, 2025, introduction of new volume tiers for utility and authentication messages

3 months

Pricing model change

Our July 1, 2025 update to our pricing model, from conversation-based pricing to per-message pricing

6 months

Rates

Rates vary based on template category, volume tier, and country/region rate.

Rate cards and volume tiers

These rate cards reflect our current rates and volume tiers, effective July 1, 2025, based on WhatsApp Business Account timezone. This information is also available interactively on our WhatsApp Business website.

Updates to rate cards

Upcoming updates

Effective October 1, 2025 at 12am by WhatsApp Business Account timezone, the rates below will apply. These updates reflect:

An increase in marketing message rates for United Arab Emirates.
An increase in utility and authentication message rates for Colombia.
A decrease in marketing message rates for Mexico.
A decrease in utility and authentication message rates for Saudi Arabia, Argentina, and Egypt.
Zimbabwe will be mapped to our "Rest of Africa" region vs. "Other."" Messages delivered to WhatsApp users with a +263 country calling code (Zimbabwe) will be charged "Rest of Africa" rates.

Rate cards effective October 1, 2025:

Previous updates

Effective July 1, 2025 – Lower utility and authentication message rates across several markets, to ensure we price on-par to alternate channels for these use cases. Marketing conversation rates became marketing message rates.
Effective April 1, 2025 – Lowered authentication-international conversation rates for Egypt, Nigeria, Pakistan, and South Africa.
Effective February 1, 2025 – Lowered authentication conversation rates for Egypt, Malaysia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, and the United Arab Emirates.
Effective November 1, 2024 – Service conversations are now free for all businesses.
Effective October 1, 2024 – Updated marketing conversation rates in India, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and the United Kingdom.
Effective August 1, 2024 – Lowered utility conversation rates.

Authentication-international rates

Specific countries have an authentication-international rate. Our rate cards reflect these rates. See Authentication-International rates to learn about these rates and if they apply to you.

Country calling codes

Charges for conversations are based on the country calling code of the recipient WhatsApp phone number. This information available in a CSV file:

Country Calling Codes and Regional Rate Mapping CSV

Volume tiers

You can unlock lower utility and authentication rates based on the number of messages you send in a month.

Tiering accrual

Messages are aggregated at the business portfolio level, across all WhatsApp Business Accounts (WABAs) owned by the portfolio — To determine what tier rates may apply in a given month for a given market–category pair, we aggregate messages across all of a business portfolio's WABAs for each market-category pair (e.g., Brazil–authentication, Brazil–utility, India–authentication, etc.).
Only messages that are charged count toward the tiers — Thus, the following messages do not count:
- Utility templates delivered to WhatsApp users within an open customer service window.
- Utility templates delivered within a free entry point window.
Volume tiers will be determined solely by Meta — All insights data is approximate due to small variations in data processing. Undue reliance should not be placed on insights data.

Key dynamics

Tiers are market–category specific — Volume tiers are aligned to our rate cards and differ by market (e.g., Brazil or Rest of Latin America) and category (utility, authentication).
Rates are tier-specific — When a business sends enough messages at a given market–category pair to reach the next tier, they unlock the rate of the next tier, specifically for messages in that tier. This rate applies across all of their WABAs.
Tiers reset monthly — At the start of the next month (12am WABA timezone), message count resets to 0 and businesses begin to accrue messages toward that month.

Volume tiers examples

The table below is illustrative and only highlights the dynamics of volume tiers. Please refer to our rate cards to see what we charge.

Below are several examples to highlight how our tiers work and what we would charge in a given month, for a given market–category. These examples refer to the illustrative table above:

Example 1: A business that sends a total of B authentication messages in a month to India is charged:

List rate for the first A messages.
Tier rate 1 for messages A+1 to B.
Total charges for that month = Rate per tier 𝗑 messages in each tier.

Example 2: A business that starts to be charged our authentication-international rates on the 15th day of the month:

Day 1 to 14 of that month: Volume tiers apply on the authentication rate.
Day 15 onward of that month: Volume tiers apply on the authentication-international rate, with messages continuing to accrue in that month. For example, if a business has already reached the Tier 2, the business would be charged Tier 2's authentication-international rate:

Example 3: A business has 3 WABAs sending authentication messages to India. For WABA A, it is still July 31 based on their timezone. For WABAs B and C, it is already August 1 based on their timezone. For July, the business is already being charged Tier Rate 1.

The business portfolio will be accruing toward tiers for both July (via WABA A) and August (via WABAs B, C) for a period of time.
The business can reach the next tier for July, via WABA A. If that happens, messages for the remainder of July for WABA A will be charged Tier Rate 2.

Example 4: A business has 3 WABAs, integrated across 2 solution providers. Provider 1 sends the first B messages in a given month, and provider 2 starts sending messages as of when the business is in the 3rd tier. The business does not send enough messages that month to reach the next tier. What we would charge each provider:

Provider 1: List rate for A messages, then Tier Rate 1 from A+1 to B, and Tier Rate 2 for B+1 to C.
Provider 2: Tier Rate 2 across all of their messages.

Tiering webhooks

New account_update trigger event and payload available starting October 1, 2025.

Starting October 1, 2025, an account_update webhook with event set to VOLUME_BASED_PRICING_TIER_UPDATE will be triggered when your WhatsApp Business Account reaches a new volume tier, in any market, in a given month. This complements our pricing_analytics endpoint, which will continue to provide intra-month tiering progress and tiering information for delivered messages.

Example webhook:

{
  "object": "whatsapp_business_account",
  "entry": [
    {
      "id": "102290129340398",
      "time": 1743451903,
      "changes": [
        {
          "value": {
            "volume_tier_info": {
                "tier_update_time": 1743451903,
                "pricing_category": "UTILITY",
                "tier": "25000001:50000000",
                "effective_month": "2025-11",
                "region": "INDIA"
            },
            "event": "VOLUME_BASED_PRICING_TIER_UPDATE"
          },
          "field": "account_update"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

tier_update_time tells when your WABA reached a higher volume tier (Unix timestamp).
pricing_category tells you the template category for which your new volume tier rate applies.
tier tells you the new volume tier's lower and upper bounds.
effective_month tells you the month in which your new volume tier rate is in effect.
region tells you the WhatsApp user country/region for which your new volume tier rate applies.

Tiering analytics

You can get volume tier information via template analytics.

Free non-template messages

Non-template messages, which can only be sent within an open customer service window, are free. These messages will have type set to free_customer_service in the pricing object of status messages webhooks:

"pricing": {
  "billable": false,
  "pricing_model": "PMP",
  "type": "free_customer_service",
  "category": "service"
}

Note that for On-Premises API users running version 2.60 and lower, type is omitted, so a category of service and billable set to false identifies these messages.

Free utility template messages

Utility template messages sent within an open customer service window are free. These messages will have type set to free_customer_service and category set to utility in the pricing object of status messages webhooks:

"pricing": {
  "billable": false,
  "pricing_model": "PMP",
  "type": "free_customer_service",
  "category": "utility"
}

Note that for On-Premises API users running version 2.60 and lower, type is omitted, so a category of utility and billable set to false identifies these messages.

Edge case

If you send a message to a WhatsApp user prior July 1, 2025 (which is when we switched from conversation-based pricing to per-message pricing), a utility conversation is opened between you and a user that spans the switch to per-message pricing (the conversation was opened before the switch but won't close until after the switch). In this case, utility templates sent to the user after the switch while the conversation is open will be free, but attributed to the open conversation. In status messages webhooks, these messages will have a pricing_model of CBP and the utility conversation ID will be assigned to conversation.id. Once the conversation closes, subsequent utility messages will use per-message pricing, which will be reflected in new webhooks.

Free Entry Point windows

If a WhatsApp user messages you via a Click to WhatsApp Ad or Facebook Page Call-to-Action button using a device running our Android or iOS app (our desktop and web apps are not supported):

A 24-hour customer service window is opened (as normal).
If you respond within 24 hours using any type of message, the message will be free, and a Free Entry Point ("FEP") window will be opened, starting from the time when you responded.

FEP windows remain open for 72 hours. While open, you can send any type of message to the user at no charge. Note, however, that the customer service window is independent of the FEP window, so if the customer service window closes, you will only be able to send template messages.

Analytics

Use the pricing_analytics field to get per-message pricing breakdowns and tiering information for delivered messages.

Webhooks

Billable messages have type set to regular in the pricing object of status messages webhooks:

"pricing": {
  "billable": true,
  "pricing_model": "PMP",
  "type": "regular",
  "category": "<PRICING_CATEGORY>"
}

The <PRICING_CATEGORY> tells you what rate was applied (e.g. marketing). See the status messages webhook reference for a list of possible values.

Note that currently, tiering information is not included in any webhooks. Use the pricing_analytics field to get tiering information for delivered messages.

Billing

Billing and billing-related actions are handled through the Meta Business Suite. See About Billing For Your WhatsApp Business Account for more information.

WhatsApp Business Calling API pricing

The WhatsApp Business Calling API has different pricing. See our Calling API pricing document to learn more.

Conversation-based pricing

Conversation-based pricing is deprecated. It was replaced with per-message pricing on July 1, 2025.

Cloud API | On-Premises API | Business Management API