Meta is ending the free 24-hour service window. Your replies to customers, and utility templates sent inside that window, start being billed. Here is exactly what it costs an Indian business, who it actually affects, and what to check before the date.
Rate card published by Meta on 1 September 2026Today, once a customer messages you, everything you send back is free for 24 hours, and each new message from them resets the clock. From 1 October 2026 those replies are charged per message. Meta calls these service messages.
Free since July 2025. From 1 October 2026 a utility template sent while the window is open costs the same as one sent after it closes, which in India is ₹0.115.
Messages customers send you are still free. Marketing templates are still charged every time, as they always have been, so nothing about campaign costs moves. And the 72-hour click-to-WhatsApp window is untouched: when someone reaches you from a Facebook or Instagram ad, everything you send stays free for 72 hours.
Meta has confirmed the rate rather than leaving it open: a service message is charged at the same rate as utility and authentication messages in your customer's market. For a customer in India that is ₹0.115 per message, roughly $0.0014. There is no new, separate price to learn.
Charging starts at the 1,001st. For a large number of small businesses this means the change costs nothing at all. Note the wording carefully: the allowance is per phone number, not per account, so it only stretches further if your conversations are genuinely spread across several numbers. Funnel everything through one number and you get 1,000, however many numbers you own.
Illustrative models, using the India rate of ₹0.115 and one phone number unless stated. These are worked examples, not customer results.
| Monthly service replies | Free | Charged | Added cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| 800, a small shop answering enquiries | 800 | 0 | ₹0 |
| 4,000, a busy D2C support desk | 1,000 | 3,000 | ₹345 |
| 25,000, a high-volume service team | 1,000 | 24,000 | ₹2,760 |
The honest summary: this is a real cost for support-heavy businesses and close to nothing for everyone else. If your WhatsApp is mostly outbound campaigns, your bill barely moves, because marketing templates were never covered by the free window in the first place.
The pricing calculator has a From 1 October 2026 mode that applies the rate, subtracts your free allowance across however many numbers you run, and shows the before and after on every plan.
Open the calculator →The change lands unevenly, and it is worth knowing which side you are on before you start re-engineering anything.
Diagnostic labs, e-commerce support desks, logistics operators, clinics. Anywhere customers message first and a human or bot replies many times a day. Every one of those replies used to be free and is now a line item once you pass the allowance.
Retailers, D2C brands and anyone whose WhatsApp is mainly broadcasts. Marketing templates have always been charged inside and outside the window, so your largest cost is unchanged.
If you built flows that deliberately send order or payment updates while the window is open, because they were free, that saving is gone. The message is the same price wherever it lands now.
Multiply by four and subtract 1,000 per number. If the result is zero or negative, you are done: the change costs you nothing and no further work is needed.
Chargeable messages need funds behind them. On WA.Expert that is your prepaid wallet, topped up in ₹1,000 steps, and message charges are drawn from it as you send. If the wallet empties, sending stops, which from 1 October includes service replies that used to go out regardless.
The messages that will now cost you are largely the same eight questions answered by hand all day. A bot answering those is the same charge per message, but it stops a person spending their afternoon on them, and it is the one lever that reduces volume rather than just moving cost around.
The 72-hour click-to-WhatsApp window stays free. For businesses already running Facebook and Instagram ads, conversations that start from an ad click remain the cheapest ones you will have.
Anything timed to fire while the window is open, specifically to avoid a charge, no longer achieves that. The logic still works; the reason for it has gone.
Meta bills by your customer's country, not yours, and the October card moved rates in several markets. Marketing went up in around seven, including Kuwait, Morocco and Mexico. Utility and authentication changed in about twelve, some up and some down. Nine markets gained standalone authentication-international pricing: Bangladesh, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Morocco, Nepal, Oman, Sri Lanka and Ukraine. India's own rates were not among those that changed. If you message customers abroad, check the current card for those markets rather than assuming last quarter's numbers hold.
Meta republishes its rate card roughly every quarter, and the figures above reflect the card published on 1 September 2026. Rates move. Before committing real budget to a new market, open Meta's current card rather than trusting any provider's blog post, including this one.
Not sure where you land? Put your numbers in and see the before and after on every plan.
Open the pricing calculator →Sources. Meta announced the change on 1 July 2026 and published the rate card taking effect 1 October 2026 on 1 September 2026. Primary reference: Meta's WhatsApp Business Platform pricing documentation and its non-template message pricing page, which states that service message rates match utility and authentication rates by market. Rates are republished roughly quarterly; this page reflects the card as at 29 September 2026.