Nov 9, 2026, 10:00:00 AM

WhatsApp Quality Rating Explained

Your WhatsApp quality rating is Meta's read on how customers have reacted to your recent messages on the WhatsApp Business API. It shows as high, medium or low (green, yellow or red). Negative feedback from customers pulls it down, and so do messages people don't read.

Since October 2025, a low rating no longer cuts your messaging limit by itself. It still decides whether your limit can grow, whether your templates keep running, and how close you are to enforcement. Meta details were checked against its developer documentation on October 15, 2026.

Two ratings, not one

Meta rates quality in two places, and they're easy to mix up.

Phone number quality rating. One rating per business phone number, based on how people have received messages from that number lately. You see it in WhatsApp Manager, and developers can read it through the API's quality_rating field.
Template quality rating. One rating per message template, based on how people react to that specific template.

A single bad template can hurt the number it's sent from, so the two move together more often than not.

What the template ratings mean

Rating	Shown in WhatsApp Manager as	What it means
Green	High quality	Little or no negative feedback. Keep going.
Yellow	Medium quality	Negative feedback from several people or low read rates. It may be paused or disabled soon.
Red	Low quality	Same signals, stronger. It's in danger of being paused or disabled soon.
Unknown	Quality pending	Not enough feedback or read data yet. Every new template starts here.

A template can still be sent while it's yellow or red. But if its status changes from approved, for example because it was paused, it stops sending until it's approved again.

What changed in October 2025

Until October 7, 2025, a number whose quality fell to low was marked "Flagged". If it stayed there for 7 days, it dropped one messaging-limit level. Meta removed that state. A quality drop no longer lowers your limit on its own.

Limits also moved from each phone number to the business portfolio. Every number in the portfolio now shares one limit, and new portfolios start at 250. That's the number of different customers you can message first, outside a customer service window, in a moving 24-hour period.

What quality still affects

Limit increases. From 2,000, your limit rises to 10,000, 100,000 and then unlimited only while you send high-quality messages across all your numbers and templates. You also need to have used half your current limit in the past 7 days. Low quality stalls growth.
Getting to 2,000. One way to unlock it is to send 2,000 delivered messages to unique customers in 30 days with high-quality templates. Meta reviews your message quality before approving it.
Templates. Ongoing negative feedback or low engagement can pause or disable a template.
Higher throughput. The upgrade to 1,000 messages per second needs an unlimited limit, 100,000 or more unique users messaged in 24 hours, and medium quality or better.
Enforcement. Meta says excessive negative feedback can lead to limits or offboarding. Its enforcement steps start with a warning. Then come 1- or 3-day blocks on template messages, 5-, 7- or 30-day blocks on all messages, and an account lock that only an appeal removes.

If you're already locked out, our guide to what to do when your number is banned walks through appeals.

What pulls your rating down

Meta doesn't publish a formula. Its documentation names negative feedback and low read rates as the signals. In practice, these habits cause most drops:

Messaging people who never asked to hear from you, or who forgot they did.
Sending the same promotion to your whole list, too often.
Templates that don't say who you are or why you're writing.
Marketing content sent as a utility template. Meta treats misclassification as a policy issue.
No easy way to stop the messages, so people block you instead.

How to improve a low rating

Pause the template or campaign behind the drop. Check which template's rating fell first in WhatsApp Manager.
Cut your audience to people who opted in recently and engaged with you. Drop contacts who never read your messages.
Rewrite the template. Put your business name and the reason for the message in the first line, keep it short, and make one clear ask.
Add an opt-out, such as a "Stop" quick-reply button, and honor it right away.
Space out marketing. Fewer, more relevant messages beat frequent blasts.
Answer replies quickly. A conversation that gets a fast, useful answer rarely ends in a block.

Ratings update automatically over time, so give the changes a few days before judging them.

What about numbers connected by QR code?

Meta's quality rating only exists on the API. A number connected to a team inbox by QR code, through the regular WhatsApp or WhatsApp Business app, has no Meta rating. The same behavior still matters, though. WhatsApp can stop a QR-connected number from starting new chats, or ban it.

For QR numbers, HaberChat shows a health score from 0 to 100. It measures how much load the number carries, such as groups and open chats, and whether WhatsApp is restricting it. A restriction takes 35 points off at once, so the score always reflects it. If that happens, read what to do when WhatsApp limits new chats. For prevention on any connection, see how to avoid getting your number banned, and the health score guide in our help center.

Frequently asked questions

What are the WhatsApp quality rating levels?

High, medium and low, shown as green, yellow and red. New templates start as unknown, or "quality pending", until there's enough feedback.

Does a low quality rating lower my messaging limit?

Not on its own since October 7, 2025, when Meta removed the Flagged state. Low quality does stop your limit from rising, and it can get templates paused.