WhatsApp API: Check Delivery Status and Read Customer Replies

Sending is only half the job. You also want to know: Did it reach the customer? Did they read it? What did they reply? This part shows three easy ways to check.

What each status means

A few things to know:

• Read does not show if the customer has turned off read receipts. Then it stays at Delivered.
• A message can be Accepted and still Fail later, for example if the number is not on WhatsApp. The status tells you why.

Way 1: The live ticks in the API Tester

When you press Send now in the API Tester, the Answer appears right under the button, in the dark panel. Its first line follows the ticks, in plain words:

• WhatsApp got your message. (just sent)
• Sent ✓ — on its way to the customer.
• Delivered ✓✓ — on the customer's phone.
• Read ✓✓ — they opened it.

Under it, the Delivery row shows the four steps: Accepted (WhatsApp got it), Sent (on its way), Delivered (on their phone) and Read (they opened it). It checks every few seconds for one minute. If WhatsApp could not deliver it, the line says Not delivered and the reason shows below.

Way 2: The Check & read pages (no coding)

In the left menu of the tester, under Check & read, there are six pages. On each one you press a navy button at the top of the dark panel (like Check status or Show customer replies), and the answer shows right under it:

• Message status: was it delivered? Read? Every message has a Tracking code (a long code from WhatsApp). After a send, it is filled in for you. Press Check status to see the ticks and any error. No code? Open Sent messages.
• Customer replies: what your customers wrote to you, newest first, including button taps (Tapped button: Yes), list choices and filled forms. Each reply has a Reply button that opens the Text page with that number filled in.
• Sent messages: press Show sent messages to see the messages you sent, newest first, each with its ticks.
• My templates: press Show my templates to see your approved templates and exactly what each one Needs. Under More options, Show only one template finds one by name.
• My forms: your WhatsApp forms and their form numbers, with Use this form (Part 6).
• My numbers: your WhatsApp numbers, with Use this number and their account IDs (For your software).

The Customer replies page shows each reply with the customer's number, name and time. A button tap shows which button was pressed. The From this number box (optional) shows only one customer's messages.

Way 3: Recent API calls in your panel

In your panel, open WhatsApp API and scroll to Recent API calls. Every message your apps sent is listed with the time (India time), type, number, result and delivery status. Use Failed to see only the problems.

And of course, every API message also appears in your Live Chat, so your team sees the full conversation.

For developers: read status and replies with the API

Every Check & read page shows its own link in the dark panel, under the answer: Use it in your software → Your link, with Copy link (opening it only shows the answer; nothing is sent). Turn on Developer view (top right of the page) to see example answers and code. Use these links with a key that has the Read permission. They work with GET or POST, just like sending.

All of them start with https://epublictouch.com/app/api/ and need your key, for example:

https://epublictouch.com/app/api/get/wa.message?secret=YOUR_API_KEY&id=wamid.HBgM...

The answer for a message looks like this:

{
  "status": 200,
  "result": "success",
  "data": {
    "messageId": "wamid.HBgM...",
    "direction": "out",
    "recipient": "919876543210",
    "type": "text",
    "status": "read",
    "created_at": "2026-10-03T10:42:05+05:30",
    "error": null
  }
}

• limit can be 1 to 100. Use page=2, page=3… for older messages. has_more tells you if there are more.
• Times are in India time (IST).
• For a failed message, error.hint explains the reason in simple words.
• Received button and list taps include reply_id, so you know which option was chosen.

What next?

Part 8 puts it all together: send a WhatsApp message automatically when someone fills your website form or when a new row comes into your Google Sheet.

Next: Part 8 — Website form and Google Sheet