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Receiving WhatsApp text messages

A contact who types into the chat produces an inbound message carrying text. It is the most common inbound arm, and the one that opens or resets the customer service window.

What an inbound text carries

text.body holds what the contact typed, and nothing else sits on the arm:
Contoh kode
{
  "id": "wam_01kya19eknftrs2s6p82asmvnh",
  "direction": "inbound",
  "from": { "phone_number": "+14155550100", "display_name": "Alex Rivera" },
  "to": { "phone_number": "+13124495569" },
  "status": "received",
  "text": { "body": "Is my order out for delivery yet?" },
  "created_at": "2026-08-25T09:04:11Z"
}
preview_url is a send-side field. An inbound text carries no flag for a link preview, whatever the contact's own client rendered, so a URL in body reads back as part of the text.
The read schema declares no maximum on an inbound body. The 4096-character cap belongs to the send side, so size your storage as unbounded text rather than to a limit the inbound arm does not promise.

A text sent as a quoted reply

When the contact replies to one of your messages by quoting it, the arm is unchanged and in_reply_to_message_id names the message they answered:
Contoh kode
{
  "id": "wam_01kyb2m4xq7whs0d8n3prv6tez",
  "direction": "inbound",
  "from": { "phone_number": "+14155550100" },
  "to": { "phone_number": "+13124495569" },
  "status": "received",
  "in_reply_to_message_id": "wam_01kya19eknftrs2s6p82asmvnh",
  "text": { "body": "Yes, that one" },
  "created_at": "2026-08-25T09:06:02Z"
}
WhatsApp does not mark every reply, and an unmarked one carries no ID at all. See quoted replies on the hub for what resolution can miss and how to correlate without it.

The webhook payload

whatsapp.received carries the same arm on the event envelope, so an endpoint acts on the text without reading the message back:
Contoh kode
{
  "type": "whatsapp.received",
  "timestamp": "2026-08-25T09:04:11.118Z",
  "data": {
    "whatsapp_id": "wam_01kya19eknftrs2s6p82asmvnh",
    "workspace_id": "ws_01ky7m235keycbnwyajabe1a6b",
    "direction": "inbound",
    "from": { "phone_number": "+14155550100", "display_name": "Alex Rivera" },
    "to": { "phone_number": "+13124495569" },
    "text": { "body": "Is my order out for delivery yet?" },
    "tags": null,
    "metadata": null
  }
}

Things to watch

  • A text is the cheapest way a contact reopens the window. Any inbound message resets the service window to 24 hours, and a text is what most contacts send; a free-form reply of your own is deliverable from that moment.
  • from can arrive without a phone number. A contact who has adopted a WhatsApp username reaches you by business-scoped user ID, so read the identity off from rather than assuming from.phone_number is set.
  • The body is the contact's own typing. A tap on something you sent arrives as an interactive reply on its own arm instead.

Next steps