#official WhatsApp API (Twilio or others)

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quartz escarp
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Hi everyone, I’ve started exploring the OpenClaw universe a bit. I’m trying to add a plugin to communicate with the official WhatsApp API. I’ve seen a lot of unofficial workarounds, but it seems the official version is used much less than the unofficial ones.

I paid for Twilio, and unfortunately, their documentation hasn’t been enough. It would probably work if I were connecting it to a different application, but since I’m trying to integrate it with OpenClaw, I’ve hit a wall that I just can’t get past.

I’ve managed to validate most of the Facebook documentation and most of the Twilio setup as well; I even used a plugin in the Sandbox and it worked. However, when I send a message from WhatsApp to the number I purchased, the message doesn't arrive. Sometimes the OpenClaw log recognizes the message and generates a response, but the agent's reply never makes it back to WhatsApp.

Has anyone faced a similar issue or knows how to solve this?

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marble gobletBOT
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Racato, the important bit: OpenClaw’s built-in WhatsApp channel is currently WhatsApp Web / Baileys, not Twilio / Meta Cloud API. The docs explicitly say there is no separate Twilio WhatsApp channel in the built-in channel registry, so a Twilio/official-API path needs to be a real custom channel plugin, not just a webhook bolted onto the existing WhatsApp channel.

Docs: https://docs.openclaw.ai/channels/whatsapp and https://docs.openclaw.ai/plugins/sdk-channel-plugins

For this symptom:

OpenClaw log recognizes the message and generates a response, but the agent reply never reaches WhatsApp

I’d check two separate directions:

  1. Inbound: Twilio webhook reaches your Gateway/plugin and your plugin calls the OpenClaw channel turn/runtime correctly.
  2. Outbound: your channel plugin must implement the send path/action adapter so OpenClaw’s final assistant reply can be delivered back through Twilio. If the agent generates text but nothing leaves, the failure is usually in this outbound adapter / target mapping layer.

Twilio-specific things I’d verify too:

  • outgoing From and To are both in whatsapp:+... format
  • you are replying within WhatsApp’s 24h customer-service window, otherwise you need an approved template
  • Twilio Message SID/status callback shows whether the send was accepted, queued, failed, or rejected