The four categories
Every template belongs to exactly one category, chosen at submission and reviewed by Meta. The category governs both what the message is allowed to say and what it costs.
- Marketing — promotions, offers, announcements, re-engagement. Charged on every delivery.
- Utility — order updates, appointment reminders, transaction notices. The only template category that is ever free: free inside an open customer service window, charged outside it.
- Authentication — one-time codes. Charged on every delivery, inside an open window as well as outside it. The window exemption does not extend to it.
- Service — your ordinary replies inside an open conversation. Free until 1 October 2026, when Meta begins charging for them at the same rates as utility and authentication.
“Utility template messages sent within an open customer service window are free.”
Per message, not per conversation
Meta moved to per-message pricing on 1 July 2025. Before that, a 24-hour conversation was the billable unit; now each delivered template message is. You are charged when the message is delivered, not when it is sent — an undelivered message is not billed.
This changes the arithmetic of a campaign. Under conversation pricing, several messages to one person inside a day cost once. Under per-message pricing they cost each. It also makes the free-inside-the-window rule worth more than it used to be.
What free actually depends on
Two windows decide most of what you pay, and they are different things.
The customer service window opens for 24 hours whenever a customer messages you. Inside it, your ordinary replies are free and so are utility templates — but not authentication or marketing templates, which are charged wherever they land. The free entry point window opens for 72 hours when somebody reaches you through a click-to-WhatsApp ad or a Facebook page call-to-action, and inside it any message type is free.
- Customer service window — 24 hours from the customer’s last message. Free: non-template replies and utility templates. Not authentication, and not marketing.
- Free entry point window — 72 hours from a click-to-WhatsApp ad. Free: everything.
- Outside both — everything is charged: marketing, utility and authentication alike.
Why miscategorising is expensive as well as risky
Submitting promotional content as utility is submitting it at the wrong price, which is why Meta enforces the boundary rather than leaving it to judgement. The rejection reason INCORRECT_CATEGORY exists for exactly this, and templates that slip through and then draw complaints take the account with them.
The honest version costs more per message and less overall: put promotional content in marketing templates, keep utility for the transactional messages people expect, and use the open window for the conversations customers started.