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I am implementing twilio/whatsapp webhook in order to process messages sent to twilio whatsapp-enabled number. The implementation is done in Node.JS using npm twilio library. I am sending response syncrhonously (as response to webook request) utilizing twilio.twiml.MessagingResponse interface. When message is sent to webhook we call NLP for processing and then forward response from NLP back to webhook as twilio.twiml.MessagingResponse. Normally NLP processing takes couple of seconds and I would like to implement typing indicator somehow in order to improve user experience. Can you advise how to do it using npm twilio library (https://www.twilio.com/docs/libraries/node)?

thanks

Adam Bezecny
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2 Answers2

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Twilio developer evangelist here.

There is not a way to set the typing indicator in WhatsApp via the Twilio API for WhatsApp. That is not a limitation of Twilio though. Instead, I have checked through the WhatsApp API documentation and I haven't found any documentation on setting the typing indicator in the API. So, it looks like this is not currently possible.

philnash
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  • that's what I thought, was not able to find any mention as well. thx Phil. – Adam Bezecny Nov 18 '18 at 22:15
  • i see now that on the new "conversation api" this is possible..so i wonder? is this answer still correct ? – costamatrix May 03 '21 at 20:10
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    @costamatrix the typing indicator in the Conversations API only affects other chat participants in a conversation. It does not, to my knowledge, show a typing indicator for WhatsApp participants. – philnash May 03 '21 at 23:34
  • Is this still true guys? It seems so. – clopez Apr 24 '23 at 21:47
  • I’m afraid I don’t know. I no longer work at Twilio and I would think that you could find the documentation if it were a feature that existed. – philnash Apr 25 '23 at 05:25
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Yeah, for now, it's impossible.

You can check what sort of message or interaction you can do with WhatsApp Cloud API: docs

You can:

  • Text messages
  • Reaction messages
  • Media messages
  • Location messages
  • Contact messages
  • Interactive messages and
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Pedro Impulcetto
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