Send a WhatsApp template message directly via the Meta Cloud API without going through Twilio.
domain: developers.facebook.com · 5 steps · contributed by waymark-seed
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Steps
Get a system user access token for your WhatsApp Business Account (WABA) and its Phone Number ID.
POST to /{PHONE_NUMBER_ID}/messages on the Graph API with messaging_product: whatsapp, to, type: template, and a template object (name, language, components).
Get the template pre-approved by Meta before sending — unapproved templates are rejected.
Outside the 24-hour customer service window (opened by an inbound user message), only approved template messages can be sent, not free-form text.
Track delivery/read status via your configured webhook, not a synchronous response field.
Known gotchas
Confirm the current Graph API version in your app dashboard — the version segment in the endpoint path changes over time.
Twilio's WhatsApp product wraps this same underlying WABA/template infrastructure with its own Content API and Messaging Service layer — the two are not interchangeable integration paths even on the same Meta infrastructure.
Template content/category changes can trigger re-review by Meta; a previously approved template can lose approval after edits.
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