What you need before you start
Four things: a Meta Business Portfolio (the container for your business assets), a business you can verify, a phone number that is not currently active on WhatsApp, and a display name you are willing to have reviewed.
- A Meta Business Portfolio — created at business.facebook.com. This owns the WhatsApp Business Account.
- Business verification — documents that prove your legal entity, such as a registration certificate, utility bill or tax document.
- A phone number — it must be able to receive an SMS or voice call, and it must not already be in use on WhatsApp.
- A display name — what customers see. It must relate to your business and follow Meta’s naming rules.
The number requirement trips up the most people, and it is three cases rather than one. A number with no WhatsApp on it is the simplest choice, because nothing on your phone changes. A number already on the WhatsApp Business app can often be connected without deleting anything when your provider supports business-app number onboarding. A number on the regular WhatsApp app cannot be registered to the API, so use a different number. A landline can work if it receives calls. Never delete a WhatsApp account to satisfy this requirement — changing numbers is always the safer move.
The setup, in order
- 1
Create or confirm your Meta Business Portfolio
Every WhatsApp Business Account lives inside a Business Portfolio. If your company already has one for Facebook Pages or Ads, use it rather than creating a second — two portfolios is a common cause of "my assets are in the wrong place" later.
- 2
Verify your business
Submit your legal business name, address and a supporting document. Verification is what unlocks the higher messaging limits and is required for an official business account.
- 3
Add and confirm your phone number
Register the number against your WhatsApp Business Account and confirm the code. Check which of the three cases above your number falls into first, because a number registered to the API can no longer be used in the regular WhatsApp app — if that number is on WhatsApp Messenger today, choose a different number rather than deleting the account.
- 4
Submit your display name
The display name is reviewed. Keep it close to your real trading name, do not stuff it with keywords, and expect a rejection if it looks like a marketing slogan.
- 5
Send your first template for approval
Template approval is a separate review from business verification. Until a template is approved you cannot message a customer outside an open service window.
Why you start with a low messaging limit, and the fastest way up
A newly created Meta Business Portfolio starts at 250 unique recipients per 24 hours, and since October 2025 that limit is shared across every number in the portfolio rather than granted per number. It counts unique people, not messages — so the practical answer to "can we message our 10,000 contacts on Friday?" is no.
Two things move the limit, and they are not equally fast. Business verification is the fast path: it is paperwork, not sending history, and it is what turns 250 into a real business. Automatic upgrades are the slower route, and they are conditional — Meta raises the tier only when message quality is high and at least half of the current limit was used in the last seven days, evaluated roughly every six hours. A business sitting at 3,000 messages against a 10,000 limit is not climbing; it is standing still, because it has not used half its allowance.
- The limit is measured in unique recipients per 24 hours, at portfolio level.
- Adding another number does not add another allowance — a new number inherits the portfolio limit.
- Business verification is the fast route up, and it needs no sending history.
- Auto-upgrades need both high quality and at least 50% of the current cap used in the last 7 days.
- Registered numbers are capped too: 2 for a new portfolio, raised to 20 once the business is verified or reaches the 2,000 limit.
Message quality ratings are affected by recipients blocking or reporting you. A single badly targeted campaign can suppress your limit, which is why opt-in discipline is a commercial issue, not just a compliance one. Treat the numbers here as the shape of the system rather than fixed figures: Meta changes them, and any platform that hardcodes them will be wrong eventually.
The three things that most often get rejected
Each rejection is fixable, and resubmission is normal rather than a sign of failure. Read the rejection reason literally: Meta states which rule was not met, and rewording to the rule clears most cases on the second attempt.
- Display name mismatch — the name does not clearly relate to the verified legal entity.
- Business verification documents — name or address that does not match the submitted business details.
- Template content — promotional wording submitted in a utility category, or a template that has no clear reason to be sent.
Common questions
Platform rules and pricing on this page are Meta’s and can change. Meta updates WhatsApp pricing only on the first day of a quarter and gives advance notice, but always confirm current rates against Meta’s own documentation before committing a budget. This page was reviewed on 29 September 2026.
Related reading
API vs Business App
The WhatsApp Business App is a free phone-based app for a single operator with no API, while the WhatsApp Business Platform (often called the WhatsApp Business API) is a paid, multi-agent, programmable service built for teams, automation and broadcast at scale.
Template approval
WhatsApp message templates are reviewed against the category you submit them in — the most common rejection is a marketing-flavoured template submitted as utility, and the fix is to describe a specific action the customer already took rather than a reason to buy.