Mark a chat as read or unread
The read state is shared by the whole team. Open a chat or reply to it and it becomes read, or set it back to “unread” to remind a teammate about it.
Steps
How it works
Shared state: the read state is saved on the chat itself, not for each teammate. If your teammate read it, it’s read for you too.
Auto-read: a setting for each session, on by default. When it’s on, Auto-read ON — chats are marked as read when opened shows. When it’s off, Auto-read OFF — chats stay unread until manually marked shows.
Replying means reading: any reply from you, even one you send straight from your phone, makes the chat read.
Read receipt for the client: when the chat is marked read, the client sees the read mark on their latest messages, up to 100 messages. The receipt isn’t sent for comment threads, or if the session was deleted.
The counter: the unread counter counts only the chats you’re allowed to see, updates straight away, and shows for each channel separately.
Voice messages: when you play a voice message, the client sees that it was played, on WhatsApp Web and WhatsApp Cloud only.
If something goes wrong
A real example
Two receptionists take turns at the front desk, and when one opens a chat just to look, the other loses track of it.
- The manager turned off auto-read on the reception number.
- A chat now stays unread until the receptionist marks it by hand or replies.
A chat no longer drops out of the Unread filter just because someone opened it.