Home›WhatsApp Business API price in India
Meta's rates, checked 2 September 2026There are two separate bills, and almost nobody explains them side by side. This page does: what Meta itself charges per message, what a platform charges to run auto-replies and broadcasts on top, a worked example with real arithmetic, and the hidden charges that catch businesses out.
This is Meta's bill, not ours. It is identical no matter which software you use to send the message — ArthMessenger, WATI, AiSensy, or Meta's own tools directly.
| Conversation category | Meta's India rate | When it applies |
|---|---|---|
| Marketing | ₹0.8631 / message | Offers, announcements, promotions — anything sent to re-engage a customer outside the 24-hour window |
| Utility | ₹0.1150 / message | Order updates, appointment confirmations, fee receipts — a transaction the customer already started |
| Authentication | ₹0.1150 / message | One-time passwords and login codes |
| Service | Free | Any reply you send within 24 hours of the customer's last message — no limit, no charge |
Meta's published rates for India, last checked on 2 September 2026. Meta can change these at any time; when it does, this page is updated the same way we update our own dashboard — we do not sit on a stale number because the old one looked better.
3,000 messages × ₹0.8631 per marketing message = ₹2,589.30, billed by Meta.
If those same 3,000 contacts also reply and you answer within 24 hours, every one of those replies is free — it is only the first outbound message that restarts the clock which is billed.
Compare that to 3,000 utility messages instead: 3,000 × ₹0.1150 = ₹345.00. The category you send in changes your bill by a factor of seven.
This is the software that turns the raw API into auto-replies, broadcasts, a shared inbox and reports. It is a flat monthly fee, unrelated to how many messages you send.
| Platform | Cheapest plan | Mid plan | Top published plan | Provider type |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ArthMessenger | ₹199/mo first 50 businesses |
₹1,299/mo (Growth) | ₹2,499/mo (Pro) | Tech Provider — you pay Meta directly |
| AiSensy | ₹1,395/mo (Basic) | ₹2,999/mo (Pro) | — | Solution Partner — can bill for messages itself |
| WATI | ₹2,699/mo (Growth) | ₹5,799/mo (Pro) | ₹16,799/mo (Business, billed quarterly) | Solution Partner — can bill for messages itself |
All plus 18% GST, all published prices read on 6 September 2026. WATI also sells a ₹999 one-off pack of 500 messages outside its plans. Plus 18% GST on ours; check each provider's own site for how they show tax.
Platform fee: ₹1,299 + 18% GST (₹233.82) = ₹1,532.82
Meta's message charge: 3,000 × ₹0.8631 = ₹2,589.30 (billed separately, by Meta, to your own card)
Total that month: ₹4,122.12 — two invoices, from two different parties, and both numbers are on this page.
A Solution Partner can add its own margin on top of Meta's rate and show you one combined number. It is not illegal, but you cannot tell how much of it is Meta's and how much is theirs unless they publish both.
A sticker price that looks lower because 18% GST is added only at checkout. Every price on this site is shown with the tax broken out, before you pay.
An order update is utility-rate; a "we miss you, here's 10% off" message about that same order is marketing-rate, at more than seven times the price. Meta, not the platform, decides the category from the template's content.
Reply at hour 23 and it's free. Reply at hour 25 and you need a fresh template, billed. Slow response teams pay for this without realising why their bill moved.
Some providers charge a one-time fee to get started, on top of the monthly plan. Ask before you sign, in writing.
WATI's top published plan is billed quarterly — the "₹16,799/mo" figure is what you're charged every three months divided by three, not what leaves your account each month.
ArthMessenger is a Meta Tech Provider, not a Solution Partner. That single fact explains most of the price gap, and it cuts against us as much as it helps you:
There are two separate charges. Meta charges per message: ₹0.8631 for a marketing message, ₹0.1150 for a utility or authentication message, and nothing for a service reply sent within 24 hours of the customer writing to you. On top of that, a software platform charges a monthly fee to give you auto-replies, broadcasts and a shared inbox — ours runs ₹199 to ₹2,499 a month plus 18% GST; others run higher. Meta's rates were last checked on 2 September 2026.
No. We are a Meta Tech Provider, not a Solution Partner, so Meta bills you directly for messages on your own WhatsApp account and the money never passes through us. We add nothing on top of Meta's published rate.
Once a customer messages you, you can reply freely — as many messages as you like, at no per-message charge — for 24 hours from their last message. After 24 hours of silence, reaching them again requires a pre-approved template message, billed as marketing or utility depending on its content.
3,000 messages multiplied by Meta's published marketing rate of ₹0.8631 comes to ₹2,589.30, billed by Meta directly. That figure is the same no matter which software platform you use — the platform fee is separate and additional.
It depends on the type of provider. A Meta Tech Provider like ArthMessenger has you add your own payment method to your WhatsApp Business Account, and Meta bills you directly at its published rate. A Meta Solution Partner such as WATI or AiSensy holds a credit line with Meta and bills you itself, usually building a margin into that bill, in exchange for the convenience of one invoice.
The most common ones: a per-message markup baked into a Solution Partner's bill that is never shown as a separate line; GST quoted separately so the sticker price looks lower than the amount actually charged; template messages billed as marketing when the business expected the cheaper utility rate; and losing the free 24-hour window by replying a few minutes late and being billed for a fresh template instead.
We are a small operation in Kota with no funded sales team, we hold no credit line with Meta so we earn nothing on your messages, and we have not built enterprise features like Salesforce and HubSpot connectors. If you need those, they are worth paying for. If you need WhatsApp to answer your customers, that is what we sell.
Put in your own message volumes and get the real total — Meta's charge, our plan, and GST, all shown with the arithmetic.
ArthMessenger