WhatsApp changes its terms to bar general purpose chatbots from its platform

Summary

Meta-owned chat app WhatsApp changed its business API policy this week to ban general-purpose chatbots from its platform. The move will likely affect WhatsApp-based assistants of companies like OpenAI, Perplexity, Khosla Ventures-backed Luzia, and General Catalyst-backed Poke. The company has added a new section to address “AI providers” in its business API terms, focusing on general-purpose chatbots. The terms, which will go into effect on January 15, 2026, say that Meta won’t allow AI model providers to distribute their AI assistants on WhatsApp. Providers and developers of artificial intelligence or machine learning technologies, including but not limited to large language models, generative artificial intelligence platforms, general-purpose artificial intelligence assistants, or similar technologies as determined by Meta in its sole discretion (“AI Providers”), are strictly prohibited from accessing or using the WhatsApp Business Solution, whether directly or indirectly, for the purposes of providing, delivering, offering, selling, or otherwise making available such technologies when such technologies are the primary (rather than incidental or ancillary) functionality being made available for use, as determined by Meta in its sole discretion. Meta confrimed this move to TechCrunch and specified that this move doesn’t affect businesses that are using AI to serve customers on WhatsApp. For instance, a travel company running a bot for customer service won’t be barred from the service. The company’s rationale behind this move is that WhatsApp Business API is designed for businesses serving customers rather than acting as a platform for chatbot distribution. The company said that while it built the API for these use cases, in recent months, it saw an unanticipated use case of serving general-purpose chatbots. “The purpose of the WhatsApp Business API is to help businesses provide customer support and send relevant updates. Our focus is on supporting the tens of thous...