Set up your shop
From nothing to answering a real customer. No code, and nothing to install.
This takes about fifteen minutes, most of which is Meta checking your number. You need your business phone number and the phone it is on, so you can read the code they send you.
1. Create your workspace
Sign up with your email and give your shop a name. You are not asked for a card, and nothing is charged. The free plan is enough to connect a number and answer customers.
2. Connect your WhatsApp number
Go to Settings › Channels and choose Connect a number. You will be taken to Meta, where you sign in with the Facebook account that runs your business, pick or create your business profile, and enter the number you want customers to message.
Meta sends a code to that number. Enter it, choose the name customers will see, and you are sent back to Engage with the number connected.
Meta will ask for a card, and that is normal
Meta asks every business for a payment method before a number can send. It does not mean you will be charged: your first 1,000 replies each month are free, and many shops never send anything that costs money. It does mean the card matters — without one, Meta stops delivering replies once that thousand is used. See What it costs for the whole picture.
3. Already using the WhatsApp Business app?
You can keep it. During the Meta step, choose the option that says the number is already on the WhatsApp Business app. Your chats stay on your phone and your team also sees them in Engage. You do not have to pick one or the other.
4. Answer your first customer
Ask a friend to message your business number. It appears in Inbox within a few seconds. Open it, type a reply, and press send — it arrives in their WhatsApp like any other message, because it is one.
Nothing sends on its own yet
Until you turn on a follow-up, Engage never messages anybody by itself. Everything that goes out is something you typed.
Next
Answering customers →
How the inbox works, and the one rule WhatsApp has about replying late.