WhatsApp Business Status: how to post, who sees it and what lasts 24 hours
Published on October 18, 2026
WhatsApp Business Status is where your business shows up for people who already have your number saved, without opening a chat.
It’s the right tool for a special hours notice, a new shelf arrival or a reminder that you still have slots today.
The official page on creating and sharing a status is clear on the main point: the update disappears from view after 24 hours.
How to post
In the Updates tab, according to the same official page:
- Text: tap the text edit icon, write your update, pick a font and background color and send, following the create status page.
- Photo: tap Add status, pick a photo or take one, add a caption, text or sticker if you want and send, per the same page.
- Video: same path as a photo; the app accepts 3GP and MPEG-4, and the video can be up to 90 seconds, according to the official page.
- Layout: under My status, Layout, you combine 2 to 6 photos into one status, per the create status page.
Before you send, Status (Contacts) lets you set the audience for that update.
On photo and video you can add up to 5 private mentions with @; people you mention get a notification and can reshare the content with their own audience, per the create status page.
On text or voice statuses, Meta notes that mentions aren’t available yet.
HD media isn’t supported for statuses, and image or video quality may be lower than the original file.
That’s why the official page asks you to upload high-quality photos so the status doesn’t look blurry.
Who sees your status
By default, the update goes to all your contacts, according to the status privacy page.
Under Updates, More options, Status privacy, you can choose:
- My contacts
- My contacts except…
- Only share with…
Privacy changes don’t affect statuses you’ve already sent.
Anyone you mention can see that status even if they’re outside the audience you picked, and if you mention a group, every group member can see it, per the privacy page.
If read receipts are off, you can’t see who opened your status.
Catalog on status
On WhatsApp Business you can put a link to your full catalog, or to a specific product or service, on your status.
The official path, on the page about sharing your catalog to status, is Tools, Catalog, Share and Add to status.
The same page notes that, by default, the status goes to all your contacts.
The 30-day archive
On WhatsApp Business, after 24 hours a status can be archived automatically on your device for up to 30 days and used as the base for an ad, according to the page about archiving your business status.
The feature may not be available to everyone yet.
When it is, Meta notifies you in the Updates tab; if you’d rather not keep them, tap Archive settings and turn off Save status updates.
With the archive on, you can create an ad from what was saved: under More options, Advertise, Your status, you pick one video or up to 10 images from the archived updates, per the archive page.
If you delete the photo or video from the status before the 24 hours are up, that update won’t go into the archive.
What status doesn’t solve
Status shows.
It doesn’t answer the customer who asks for a price, doesn’t book a slot on the calendar and doesn’t hand a hard conversation to someone on the team.
Anyone who only posts status and then goes quiet loses the contact at the moment the person taps the profile and writes.
Where we come in
We set up the assistant on your business’s WhatsApp with your own content, books on your real calendar when that’s what’s needed, and hands anything off-script to a person.
Status stays the temporary poster; the chat that starts from there is what we run.