---
title: "Inbox"
description: "Shared workspace for WhatsApp conversations — real-time threads, templates, reactions, quote-replies."
section: "Features"
canonical: https://wacrm.tech/docs/inbox
dateModified: 2026-06-18
---
# Inbox

The **Inbox** is your team's shared workspace for every WhatsApp
conversation. One thread per contact, real-time as messages arrive,
template-aware composer, reactions and quote-replies.

If you're new to wacrm, this is the surface you'll spend most of
your day on.

## Layout

Three panes on desktop:

| Pane | What's in it |
|---|---|
| **Left** — Conversation list | All conversations, newest reply first. Search, status filter (Open / Pending / Closed), unread badges. |
| **Middle** — Message thread | Selected conversation's messages, oldest at top. Composer at the bottom. Manual refresh icon next to the status dropdown. |
| **Right** — Contact sidebar | Phone, tags, notes, deal cards, recent conversation history. Edit-in-place fields. |

On mobile the right pane collapses into a "Contact" button at the
top of the thread; the conversation list becomes a back arrow once
you open a thread.

Deep-links work: `/inbox?c=<conversation_id>` opens straight to a
specific thread. Useful when an automation toast or a teammate's
Slack link points at a specific customer.

## Conversation statuses

| Status | When to use | Visible badge |
|---|---|---|
| **Open** | Active back-and-forth. Default for any new inbound. | Green dot |
| **Pending** | Customer is waiting on you / handed off to an agent. The agent who picks it up changes it back to Open. | Amber dot |
| **Closed** | Resolved. Hidden from the default filter; still searchable. | Slate dot |

Changing status is a one-tap action in the thread header. A Flow's
`handoff` node sets status to **Pending** automatically.

## Sending a message

The composer supports five kinds of outbound:

1. **Plain text** — type and hit Enter (Shift+Enter for newline).
2. **Pre-approved template** — click the template picker, search by
   name or category, fill in any body `{{1}}`, `{{2}}` variables
   (plus a header variable or URL-button value if the template uses
   them) in the inline preview, send. Build and approve templates in
   [Settings → Templates](https://wacrm.tech/docs/templates).
3. **Media** — photo, video, document, or voice note. Click the
   paperclip, pick a type (or record a voice note), add an optional
   caption, send. See [Sending media](#sending-media) below.
4. **Reply-to-quote** — hover or long-press a message, pick the
   reply icon. The composer shows the quoted preview above the
   text field; the recipient sees the same quote tile in WhatsApp.
5. **Reaction** — hover or long-press a message, tap an emoji from
   the picker. Reactions also forward to WhatsApp and round-trip:
   customer-side reactions appear here within ~1s of the webhook.

> Within the 24-hour customer-service window WhatsApp accepts
> free-form text and media. Outside that window Meta enforces
> template-only sends. The composer warns when the window is closed.

## Sending media

Click the **paperclip** in the composer to attach a **photo**,
**video**, or **document**, or to record a **voice note**. The file
uploads to Supabase Storage (the `chat-media` bucket, scoped to your
account) and WhatsApp fetches it from there when the message sends.

| Type | Formats | Size limit | Caption |
|---|---|---|---|
| Photo | PNG, JPEG, WebP | 5 MB | Yes |
| Video | MP4, 3GP | 16 MB | Yes |
| Document | PDF, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, TXT | 16 MB | Yes |
| Voice note | recorded in-app | 16 MB | — |

- **Captions** are optional on photo/video/document (Meta caps them
  at 1024 characters). Voice notes carry no caption.
- **Voice notes** are recorded straight in the browser and encoded to
  Ogg/Opus locally — no server-side conversion — so WhatsApp renders
  them as a true voice note. Recording auto-stops at 5 minutes; mic
  access is requested the first time you record.
- **Preview before sending.** After you pick a file (or stop a
  recording) the composer shows a preview with the caption field and a
  send button. Discard it with the ✕ and the upload is cleaned up.
- The 24-hour customer-service window applies to media exactly as it
  does to text — outside the window, send an approved template first.

## Real time

Two Supabase realtime subscriptions wire the page:

- **messages** — new INSERTs from the webhook appear in the thread
  without a refresh. If the new message belongs to a conversation
  not yet in your list (a brand-new contact's first inbound), the
  conversation is hydrated inline.
- **conversations** — status changes, unread counter bumps, and
  last-message updates flow into the conversation list.

The page also runs a **resync token** that bumps when the tab
regains focus or the websocket reconnects. A bump re-fetches the
last 50 messages of the active thread to catch anything missed
during disconnect.

## Message bubbles

Each bubble shows: the text (or media affordance), the timestamp,
and a delivery status icon on outbound messages:

| Icon | Meaning |
|---|---|
| ◦ | Sending — request queued, no Meta ack yet |
| ✓ | Sent — Meta accepted the message |
| ✓✓ | Delivered — phone confirmed receipt |
| ✓✓ (filled) | Read — customer opened the chat |
| ! | Failed — see the error tooltip; tap to retry |

Reactions appear as small chips at the bottom-right of a bubble.
Quote-replies show a left-bordered quote tile above the reply text
(scroll-into-view if you tap the quote to find the original).

**Interactive replies** — when a customer taps a button or list
row sent by a Flow, the bubble renders with a small `"Button
reply"` label so agents can tell at a glance the customer chose an
option (didn't type the words). See [Flows](https://wacrm.tech/docs/flows) for context.

## Contact sidebar

Lives in the right pane. Inline-editable fields:

- **Name, email, company** — click to edit, blur to save.
- **Tags** — add/remove from the chip row; tags are managed in
  Settings → Tags.
- **Notes** — free-form scratch pad, internal-only.
- **Active deals** — small cards linking to the pipelines view,
  with stage + value.
- **Recent conversations** — last 5 threads with this contact.

Edits hit the same RLS-scoped API the contacts page uses; changes
are immediately reflected wherever the contact appears.

## Search

Top-of-list search runs `ilike` across the contact's name, phone,
and the last message preview. It does NOT full-text search every
message body — that's intentional to keep the inbox snappy on
large tenants. For message-body search use a Supabase SQL query
against `messages.content_text`.

## Bulk actions

Not in 0.2.0. Multi-select + bulk close / assign / tag is on the
v0.3 list. For now: open a conversation, change its status, move
on.

## Limits & notes

- **Conversation list is paginated server-side.** First page = 50
  rows; scroll or load-more for older threads.
- **Message thread loads 50 messages per fetch.** Earlier messages
  load on scroll.
- **WhatsApp delivery receipts depend on the customer's privacy
  settings.** If they've disabled read receipts you'll see ✓✓ but
  never the filled (read) variant.
- **Media in messages.** Inbound media downloads on demand the
  first time a bubble renders, then caches in Supabase Storage
  (`message-media` bucket). The first view of a heavy file can lag.
  Outbound media you send is uploaded to the `chat-media` bucket and
  served from there — see [Sending media](#sending-media).
- **24-hour window.** Meta's customer-service window: once the
  customer messages you, you have 24 hours of free-form replies.
  After that, only approved templates send. The window resets on
  every inbound from that customer.

## Where to file bugs

[github.com/ArnasDon/wacrm/issues](https://github.com/ArnasDon/wacrm/issues),
label `inbox`.