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I have my bot working well but the welcome message option "Get Started" only appears on desktop, there is no option appearing in the iOS messenger version and no welcome message is sent. Anyone got the welcome message working in Messenger on iOS.

Update: it seems to be intermittent. It's appeared once on my iOS device inside the messenger app but I can't repeat it.

Lee Woodman
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As per the documentation of Facebook messenger platform here, the welcome screen appears only once for a user when he/she starts the conversation. It will not appear for the same user ever again on mobile.

From the docs:

The Welcome Screen only appears for new conversations. On mobile, deleting conversations will not cause the Welcome Screen to appear again. On desktop web, if you delete the conversation, you can make the Welcome Screen appear again.

enter image description here So, if you want to see the welcome screen again I'd suggest to add another user as a tester in your Facebook application (https://developers.facebook.com/apps/YOUR_APP_ID/roles/) and start a new conversation but don't click on the "Get Started" button unless you're done editing this screen because it won't appear for this user again.

Edit: 2016-07-26

Facebook has removed the documentation pages previously mentioned in this post. Now, there's a new page on Get Started button here, which says:

The Get Started button is only rendered the first time the user interacts with a Page on Messenger.

Mukarram Khalid
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  • That's not correct...on deleting my conversation and then when re-interacting with the bot again I get the "Get Started" option and see the welcome message after clicking it. I do not get this option in iOS though. – Lee Woodman Apr 25 '16 at 09:35
  • It'll show the "Get Started" message if you open the Facebook chat in browsers after deleting the conversation but not in FB messenger app (IOS or Android). – Mukarram Khalid Apr 25 '16 at 10:20
  • Where are you seeing that documented? – Lee Woodman Apr 25 '16 at 11:20
  • This documentation is for the messenger platform and it clearly states that deleting the conversation will not show the welcome screen again and it shows only for new conversations. Here's the [link](https://developers.facebook.com/docs/messenger-platform/implementation#welcome_screen). I have also added a screenshot in the OP. – Mukarram Khalid Apr 25 '16 at 11:41
  • I have seen the docs and had read this but the fact it shows up on Desktop (after deleting the conversation) made me think this was a bug, but it seems by design...why would they do that? This makes creating the screen cast for App review for example, tricky as (unless you have access to another user), you can't demo the full user experience. – Lee Woodman Apr 25 '16 at 12:05
  • It didn't appear again for me on the desktop, after deleting the conversation. – Klemens Zleptnig Jun 07 '16 at 23:13
  • And it doesn't appear at www.messenger.com at all, even if it's a completely new conversation. – Klemens Zleptnig Jun 08 '16 at 17:17
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Yeah, you're both right and there's a bit of nuance here which is a little confusing.

For mobile, deleting a conversation won't cause the Welcome Screen to appear. On desktop, deleting a conversation will cause the Welcome Screen to appear. I'll modify the docs so that this is more clear.

pschang
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  • Thanks for clarifying...to submit my App review screencast too some effort to make it appear as though it was my first interaction. :-/ Why not show it for mobile i don't understand the reason behind that? – Lee Woodman Apr 28 '16 at 20:47
  • There's more nuance here depending on the mobile platform and the technical architecture. Thanks for the feedback and we'll try to make it better. – pschang May 09 '16 at 20:43