About this plugin
Dispatchable Order Messaging brings WooCommerce order communication to WhatsApp, the channel your customers already use every day — with a single click, no Meta Business API account, and nothing routed through a third-party service.
Built for merchants in WhatsApp-first, cash-on-delivery-heavy markets who already message customers about their orders by hand, copying details from the order screen into a chat. This plugin turns that into one click instead.
For a full step-by-step setup guide with screenshots and troubleshooting, see the Setup Guide.
What it does
- WhatsApp button on the product and cart pages — a single click opens WhatsApp with a pre-filled message including the product name and price.
- “Notify Customer” on each order — a one-click button on the order screen opens a WhatsApp message pre-filled from that order’s own data and your message template for its current status, ready for you to review and send.
- Bulk “Notify Customer” — select several orders from the Orders list and the plugin steps you through them one at a time: review the pre-filled message, open WhatsApp, send it, click “Sent — Next,” and move to the next order. Every message still goes through your own WhatsApp — nothing sends automatically, individually or in bulk.
- Customer-facing “Message us about this order” link on the order-received (thank-you) page and in WooCommerce order emails.
- Editable message templates, one per order status, with placeholders for the customer’s name, order number, total, status, tracking number, and item list.
- A local log of notifications you’ve sent, viewable under WooCommerce → WhatsApp Log, for your own records.
- Full compatibility with WooCommerce High-Performance Order Storage (HPOS) and the WooCommerce Cart/Checkout blocks.
What it deliberately does not do
This plugin never sends a WhatsApp message on its own. Every notification — single or bulk — opens WhatsApp with the message already written, and a person still has to review it and tap Send. There is no background sending, no Meta Cloud API connection, and no external service in the middle of your message traffic or your customers’ data.
Automatic, no-click sending is intentionally outside the scope of this free plugin.
Want it fully automatic? (Pro)
Dispatchable Order Messaging Pro builds on this free plugin and replaces the one-click “you still tap Send” workflow with fully automatic WhatsApp notifications sent through your own Meta Cloud API account — no third-party service ever sees your messages. Pro adds:
- Automatic, no-click sending on order-status triggers, individually and in bulk
- Delivery status tracking (sent, delivered, read, failed) via Meta webhooks
- A combined message log with CSV export
- Automatic retries on failed sends
- A reliable background queue built on Action Scheduler
Pro requires this free plugin and your own Meta Business/Cloud API account. Learn more about Pro.
Why WhatsApp instead of email
In many markets, email has low open rates and low trust compared to WhatsApp, where customers already expect to hear from businesses they’ve ordered from. WooCommerce’s built-in order communication is email-only; this plugin adds the channel your customers actually check.
Privacy and data handling
This plugin makes no external API calls and sends nothing to any DispatchWP-operated or third-party server. me links — the same mechanism as clicking any WhatsApp link elsewhere on the web. No API keys, no external account, no data collection.