# WhatsApp Business messaging limits: tiers, what is counted and how to raise them

> Meta limits how many different customers you can message outside the customer service window in a rolling 24 hours: 250 for a newly created business portfolio, then 2,000, 10,000, 100,000 and unlimited. The limit is set for the business portfolio, not for a single number, and your replies inside the 24 hour window do not count towards it.

Key points

- The limit counts different customer phone numbers, not messages: 250 for a newly created business portfolio, then 2,000, 10,000, 100,000 and unlimited.
- It only applies to messages sent outside the customer service window, so to templates. Replying to a customer who has just written does not use it up.
- It is shared by every number in the portfolio: a single number can use up all the capacity.
- It rises one level, in about 6 hours, if your message quality is good and you have used at least half of it over 7 days.

## The limit tiers

Meta limits how many different customers you can message outside the customer service window in a rolling 24 hours. The limit is set for the business portfolio and shared by all its numbers: 250 for a newly created business portfolio, then 2,000, 10,000, 100,000 and unlimited. To reach 2,000: verify your business, have it verified by the partner that onboarded it, or deliver 2,000 messages outside the service window to different numbers within 30 days using high-quality templates. Meta then reviews your quality and approves or declines. After that, the limit rises one level in about 6 hours if quality is good and at least half of it was used over the past 7 days.

| Tier | How you reach it |
| --- | --- |
| 250 | Starting point for a newly created business portfolio. |
| 2,000 | One of three routes: verify the business, have it verified by the partner that onboarded it, or deliver 2,000 messages outside the service window to different numbers within 30 days using high-quality templates. Meta then reviews quality and approves or declines. |
| 10,000, 100,000, then unlimited | Automatic scaling, one level at a time, once the quality and usage criteria are met. |

*Source: Meta’s documentation on messaging limits, checked on 16 October 2026.*

## What the limit counts, and what it does not

Meta defines the limit as the maximum number of unique customer phone numbers your business can deliver messages to, outside a customer service window, within a moving 24 hour period.

- It counts unique numbers: writing to the same customer five times in the period counts them once.
- It only counts what is sent outside the service window. Your replies to a customer who has written or called in the last 24 hours are not part of it.
- It is calculated and set at business portfolio level, and shared by all its numbers. With several numbers, one of them can use all of the portfolio’s capacity in the period.

### Not to be confused with other figures

- **The 250 templates**: On an unverified portfolio, each WhatsApp account is limited to 250 [message templates](https://wyp.chat/en/glossary#modele). Up to 6,000 if it is verified and a number has an approved display name. It is the number of templates you can have, not the number of customers you can contact.
- **The 250 “conversations”**: The [messaging limit](https://wyp.chat/en/glossary#limite-envoi) does not count conversations. It counts unique customer numbers. The word survives in the names of some Meta technical fields, such as “max\_daily\_conversations\_per\_business”, and comes from the old per-conversation pricing, replaced by per-message pricing on 1 July 2025.
- **The free service message allowance**: It is a pricing allowance, not a sending limit: 1,000 [service messages](https://wyp.chat/en/glossary#message-service) a month per number before charging starts.
- **Throughput**: A number used with both the WhatsApp Business app and the API has a fixed throughput of 20 messages per second, according to Meta’s [coexistence](https://wyp.chat/en/glossary#coexistence) documentation. It is a sending speed, not a ceiling on customers.

Since 8 October 2025, according to Meta’s changelog, the limit is calculated on the business portfolio rather than the number, and the first increase is to 2,000 instead of 1,000.

- [The WhatsApp 24 hour window](https://wyp.chat/en/guides/whatsapp-24-hour-window)

## Where to see your limit, and how to raise it

1. Open WhatsApp Manager.
2. Go to Account tools, then Messaging limits: your number’s current limit is shown there.

Technical teams can also read it through Meta’s API, in the portfolio’s “whatsapp\_business\_manager\_messaging\_limit” field. The old “messaging\_limit\_tier” field is deprecated.

- To reach 2,000: one of the three routes in the table above. If Meta approves, the limit moves to 2,000 straight away and you are told by email.
- If Meta declines, the limit stays where it is and an alert points to other possible routes, for example delivering 2,000 messages outside the service window to different numbers within 30 days using high-quality templates.
- Beyond 2,000, the rise is automatic: one level in about 6 hours if quality is good and you have used at least half of the limit over 7 days. Meta Business Help says “more than 50%” where the developer documentation says “at least half”.

## The limit and your number’s quality

Quality decides whether the limit rises. Meta requires high-quality messages across all your numbers and templates, and it measures that from customer reactions: blocks, reports, the reasons given when blocking.

In other words, sending more does not raise the limit if customers block or report your messages. The quality page covers the green, yellow and red ratings, what Meta measures and how to recover a number.

- [WhatsApp Business number quality rating](https://wyp.chat/en/guides/whatsapp-quality-rating)

## What WYP.chat does with the limit in your campaigns

- WYP.chat reads the limit from Meta and rereads it at most once an hour, or when you click “Refresh”.
- A campaign goes out in batches of at most 100 contacts. Before each batch, WYP.chat counts the recipients already handled over the last 24 hours, across all numbers of the same WhatsApp account (an approximation of the portfolio), and does not exceed the room left.
- When the day’s limit is reached, the campaign stops by itself and the tracking screen shows: “Meta’s daily limit reached: sending resumes automatically within 24 h.” It resumes on its own, with nothing for you to do. A contact never receives the same message twice if a batch is replayed.
- You can also restrict sending to certain days and hours.

WYP.chat only counts recipients of its own campaigns. If another tool writes on the same portfolio, it cannot see that, and Meta keeps the final say. WYP.chat does not raise your limit: only verification and quality do.

- [WhatsApp campaigns](https://wyp.chat/en/features/whatsapp-campaigns)
- [WhatsApp consent: what Meta and the law require](https://wyp.chat/en/guides/whatsapp-consent)

## How to do it in WYP.chat

Help centre articles that walk through each setting, screen by screen.

- [Send a WhatsApp campaign](https://wyp.chat/en/help/lancer-campagne)
- [What you pay Meta on WhatsApp](https://wyp.chat/en/help/prix-messages-whatsapp)
- [Write to a customer after 24 hours](https://wyp.chat/en/help/modeles-24h)

## Sources

1. Meta, Messaging limits: [developers.facebook.com/documentation/business-messaging/whatsapp/messaging-limits](https://developers.facebook.com/documentation/business-messaging/whatsapp/messaging-limits)
2. Meta, WhatsApp changelog (8 October 2025): [developers.facebook.com/documentation/business-messaging/whatsapp/changelog](https://developers.facebook.com/documentation/business-messaging/whatsapp/changelog)
3. Meta Business Help, About your WhatsApp Business phone number quality rating: [www.facebook.com/business/help/896873687365001](https://www.facebook.com/business/help/896873687365001)
4. Meta, Template fundamentals: [developers.facebook.com/documentation/business-messaging/whatsapp/templates/overview](https://developers.facebook.com/documentation/business-messaging/whatsapp/templates/overview)
5. Meta, Onboarding WhatsApp Business app users (coexistence): [developers.facebook.com/documentation/business-messaging/whatsapp/embedded-signup/onboarding-business-app-users/](https://developers.facebook.com/documentation/business-messaging/whatsapp/embedded-signup/onboarding-business-app-users/)

Pages checked on 16 October 2026.

## Frequently asked questions

### What is the message limit of a new WhatsApp Business account?

250 different customers in a rolling 24 hours, outside the customer service window, for a newly created business portfolio.

### How do you get to 2,000?

By one of these routes: verify the business, have it verified by the partner that onboarded it, or deliver 2,000 messages outside the window to different numbers within 30 days using high-quality templates. Meta then reviews quality.

### Where can I see my messaging limit?

In WhatsApp Manager, under Account tools, then Messaging limits.

### Do replies to my customers count towards the limit?

No. The limit counts numbers messaged outside the customer service window. A reply sent within 24 hours of a customer’s message is inside the window.

### Do several numbers share the limit?

Yes. It is calculated and set for the business portfolio and shared by all its numbers: a single number can use up all the capacity.

### Is the limit 250 conversations?

No, it is 250 unique customer numbers for a new portfolio. The word “conversations” survives in the name of some Meta technical fields, a legacy of the old per-conversation pricing.

### What does WYP.chat do when my campaign goes over the day’s limit?

The campaign waits, shows that Meta’s limit has been reached and resumes on its own within 24 hours.

## Read next

- [WhatsApp Business quality rating: what Meta measures and how to stay green](https://wyp.chat/en/guides/whatsapp-quality-rating)
- [The WhatsApp 24 hour window: what Meta allows and what it costs](https://wyp.chat/en/guides/whatsapp-24-hour-window)
- [The three WhatsApp Business template categories, and how Meta re-categorises them](https://wyp.chat/en/guides/whatsapp-template-categories)
- [WhatsApp Business message pricing by country in 2026](https://wyp.chat/en/guides/whatsapp-message-pricing)

---

Source: https://wyp.chat/en/guides/whatsapp-messaging-limits · Updated on 16 October 2026