A channel is one way customers reach you — one WhatsApp number, one website widget, one mailbox. In the dashboard a channel appears as an inbox: the two words describe the same thing from different sides. The channel is the connection to the outside world; the inbox is where its conversations land.
Everything else depends on having at least one. Contacts are created by the messages that arrive through a channel, automation reacts to them, and campaigns go out through them. Until a channel exists, the dashboard has nothing to show you.
Which channels you can connect
| Channel | What it connects |
|---|---|
| a WhatsApp Business number | |
| Website | a live-chat widget on your own site |
| a mailbox, so replies arrive as conversations | |
| SMS | text messages through Twilio or Bandwidth |
| Telegram | a Telegram bot |
| Line | a Line account |
| a Facebook page's Messenger inbox | |
| an Instagram account's direct messages | |
| API | your own application, through Lynomia Chat's API |
Some of these depend on how your installation is configured, and you will see them greyed out rather than hidden. Facebook and Instagram need a Meta app set up on the installation itself. TikTok appears only where it has been configured. Voice and WhatsApp calling are marked beta and depend on being switched on for your account. If a channel you want is not selectable, that is an installation-level setting, not something you can change from your account.
Why WhatsApp first
In the Gulf, WhatsApp is usually not one channel among several — it is where the customers already are. It is also the channel with the most rules, which is the real reason to connect it early: the sooner you have a number connected, the sooner you find out what Meta will and will not let you send.
The one rule that shapes everything else: once a customer messages you, you can reply freely for 24 hours. After that, a plain message will not go out. You may only send an approved template. See The WhatsApp 24-hour window.
What you need first
An administrator account. For WhatsApp you also need a phone number that is not already in use on personal WhatsApp, and access to the Meta Business account that owns it — or, if you are connecting through Twilio, your Twilio credentials.
Steps
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Go to Settings → Inboxes and choose to add an inbox.
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Pick the channel. For WhatsApp, pick your provider next:
Provider Use it when WhatsApp Cloud — quick setup through Meta you are connecting a number through Meta and want the connection configured for you WhatsApp Cloud — manual setup the number is already on the WhatsApp Cloud API and you hold its credentials WhatsApp Business the number is live in the WhatsApp Business app on a phone and you want to keep using it there Twilio WhatsApp is already running through your Twilio account -
Complete the provider's own step. Quick setup sends you to Meta to sign in and choose the number. Manual setup asks for the phone number, its phone number ID, the business account ID, an API key and a webhook verify token.
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Choose which agents work in this channel. An agent who is not a member sees nothing from it. Administrators see every channel without being added.
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Finish. For WhatsApp you are shown a QR code — scan it with your own phone to send the channel a test message and watch it arrive.
A worked example
A perfume shop in Dubai connects its WhatsApp number using quick setup through Meta, adds its two sales staff as members, and finishes. It scans the QR code, sends "hello" from a personal phone, and the conversation appears in Conversations within seconds, unassigned. One of the two staff is online, so auto-assignment hands it to her.
Only then does the shop set the channel's business hours, because a new channel is created on UTC time, and Dubai is four hours ahead.
Who can do this
Administrators. Agents cannot see the Inboxes settings at all, let alone connect a channel.
Limits
- A new channel's timezone is UTC until you change it. Business hours and out-of-office replies will be wrong by your local offset until you do.
- Auto-assignment is on for a new channel and only considers members who are online. If nobody is online, conversations wait, unassigned.
- WhatsApp templates belong to the WhatsApp number, not to Lynomia Chat. Only Meta can approve one, and it can reject one.
- Quick setup through Meta is not available on every account, and Meta occasionally restricts it at their end. When that happens, the manual Cloud API route is still open for a number already on the Cloud API.
Related
- Connect WhatsApp
- The WhatsApp 24-hour window
- WhatsApp Business coexistence
- Set up an inbox
- Your first conversation
If it does not work
The channel you want is greyed out. It needs configuration on the installation, not in your account. Ask your provider.
Meta's setup window closed without a number. Run quick setup again and add a phone number to the WhatsApp Business account during the Meta steps. A setup that finishes without one cannot produce a channel.
Your test message never arrived. Confirm you messaged the connected number from a different phone, and that setup reached the final step rather than stopping at the agent step.
Nothing you send goes out. Check whether the last incoming message is more than 24 hours old. On WhatsApp that is the window, not a fault.