How to Use auton8n: Complete Step-by-Step Guide (2026)

Short answer: create an account at auton8n.in/auth/register, create a workspace, choose a plan, connect your WhatsApp number from Connect WABA, import your contacts, create a message template and send your first campaign from Campaigns. Then turn on automatic replies and chatbots so customers get answers 24/7. This guide walks through every part of auton8n, in the order you will use it, with the exact names of the menus and buttons.

What you need before you start

• An email address and phone number for your auton8n account
• A Facebook account and a Meta business portfolio (you can create one while connecting)
• A phone number for WhatsApp that is not in use on the WhatsApp or WhatsApp Business app, or one that you delete from the app first
• Your contact list as an Excel or CSV file, with country codes in the phone numbers

New to the API? Read how to get the WhatsApp Business API in India and WhatsApp Business App vs API first.

Step 1: Create your account

• Open Sign up and fill in Full Name, Email Address, Phone Number, Country Name, Password and Confirm Password. The name can contain only letters and spaces, and the password needs at least 8 characters.
• Click Sign up. We email you a 6-digit verification code, valid for 10 minutes.
• Enter the code and click Verify & create account. Use Resend code if it does not arrive, and check your spam folder.
• Log in at auton8n.in/auth/login with User selected. Team members you add later log in with Agent selected.

Forgot your password? Click Forgot password? on the login page, enter your email, click Send OTP and set a new password with the code.

Step 2: Create a workspace

A workspace holds one business: its WhatsApp number, contacts, templates and automations. After your first login, click Create First Workspace, enter a Workspace Name (and a description if you like) and click Create Workspace. Agencies and businesses with several brands can add more with New Workspace and switch between them.

Step 3: Choose a plan

Open My Subscription → Subscriptions in the sidebar, click Select Plan on the plan you want, add a coupon code if you have one, choose a payment method (for example Razorpay for UPI and cards in India) and click Complete Purchase. Plans differ in contacts, campaigns, chatbot flows, AI prompts, team members and features such as WhatsApp Forms, calling, catalog and Instagram. Compare them on the pricing page. WhatsApp's own per-message charges are billed by Meta, see WhatsApp API pricing in India.

Step 4: Connect your WhatsApp number

Open WhatsApp → Connect WABA. On the WhatsApp Business card click Connect. Meta's signup window opens:

• Log in with Facebook and choose or create your business portfolio.
• Create or pick a WhatsApp Business Account and enter your business details.
• Add your phone number and verify it with the code Meta sends by SMS or voice call.
• Choose a display name that matches your business name.

Already have a Meta app and Cloud API number? Use the Manual (Cloud API) tab instead: enter Phone Number ID, WhatsApp Business ID, App ID, Registered Phone Number (with + and country code), Business ID and Access Token, then click Save Changes. Copy the Webhook URL and Verification Token shown on the same page into your Meta app's webhook settings.

Then add a payment method for your WhatsApp Business Account in Meta Business settings, and start Meta business verification to raise your messaging limits.

Step 5: Check your number's status

WhatsApp → WABA Phone Numbers lists your connected numbers with the verified name, phone number ID and quality rating (Green, Yellow or Red). Green means customers are happy with your messages. If it turns Yellow or Red, send fewer marketing messages and only to people who opted in. If Meta gives you a new access token, use Update Access Token here.

Step 6: Import your contacts

Open CRM & Contacts → Contacts. Add one person with Add Contact, or many with Import:

• Click Download Sample Template to get the correct format (contacts.xlsx).
• Required columns: name and phone_number. Optional: email, tags (comma-separated), status, source, and any custom fields.
• Write phone numbers with the country code and without a leading zero, for example 919876543210 for India. Numbers must be 10 to 15 digits.
• Upload the .xlsx, .xls or .csv file. You can add tags and a status to every imported row.

The import runs in the background. Follow it in Import Jobs, and use Download Error Log to see rows that failed. If a phone number already exists, that contact is updated instead of duplicated.

Organise contacts with Tags (name and colour), Columns (custom fields such as city, budget or course, with types like text, number, date or dropdown) and Smart Segments (saved filters on name, phone, country, tags, created date, last active or platform; use Preview to see how many contacts match).

Step 7: Create message templates

To start a conversation, or to message someone more than 24 hours after their last message, WhatsApp requires a template approved by Meta. Open WhatsApp → Templates and click Create New Template:

• Template Name: lowercase letters, numbers and underscores, for example diwali_offer_2026.
• Template Language and Template Category: Marketing (offers), Utility (order and booking updates) or Authentication (OTPs).
• For Marketing, pick a type: Standard, Limited Time Offer, Coupon Code, Catalog, Call Permission, Carousel Product or Carousel Media.
• Header (optional): text up to 60 characters, or an image (JPG/PNG up to 5 MB), video (MP4 up to 16 MB), document (PDF up to 100 MB) or location.
• Message Body: up to 1,024 characters. Click Add Variable to insert {{1}}, {{2}} for personal details and give an example for each.
• Footer (optional, up to 60 characters) and buttons: up to 10 quick replies, 2 website links, 1 phone number and 1 copy-code button.

Check the live preview and click Submit Template. Status changes from Pending to Approved or Rejected, usually within minutes. Short on ideas? Use Build with AI (choose industry, occasion, purpose and tone, then Generate Template), or start from the ready templates under Explore by Sector with Use Template. Templates you made directly in Meta can be imported with Sync. More tips in our template guide.

Step 8: Send your first campaign

Open WhatsApp → Campaigns and click Create Campaign. The wizard has five steps:

• Basic Information: a campaign name and description.
• WhatsApp Config: your WhatsApp account and an approved template.
• Variable Mapping: fill each {{variable}} from a contact field (name, phone, email or a custom field) or a fixed value, and add the header image, coupon code or carousel cards if the template has them.
• Recipients: All Contacts, Segment by Tags, or Specific Contacts.
• Schedule: Send Immediately or Schedule for Later, then Launch Campaign.

The campaign list shows sent, delivered, read and failed counts. Open a campaign to see why messages failed and download the report. Start small, send only to people who opted in, and read how to send bulk WhatsApp messages without getting blocked.

Step 9: Answer customers in the team inbox

WhatsApp Inbox shows every chat. Filter by All, Unread, Assigned, Unassigned or Active, or by agent, tag and date. In a chat you can:

• Assign it to an agent, add private notes and labels from the contact panel.
• Send text, media, audio, buttons, lists and locations.
• Use AI Suggest Reply for ready answers, or AI tools to translate, summarise, improve or change the tone of your message (needs AI Config, see Step 12).
• Click Resolve when the chat is done, and Reopen if needed.

WhatsApp lets you send free-form replies for 24 hours after the customer's last message. After that the inbox shows "The 24-hour service window has closed" and a Send Template button, so you can continue with an approved template.

Step 10: Set up automatic replies

First save the messages you want to reuse in WhatsApp → Reply Materials: texts, images, documents, videos, templates, catalogues, forms, chatbots and saved answers. Then use them in:

• Default Action: a Welcome Message for new chats, an Out of Working Hours message, a Delayed Reply if nobody answers within a set number of minutes, a Fallback Message when no keyword matches, and a Re-engagement Message. Set your hours in Set Working Hours (with Holiday Mode), and turn on Round Robin Assignment to share new chats evenly between agents.
• Keyword Action: click Add Keyword Action, type keywords such as PRICE or MENU (press Enter after each), choose how they match (Exact Match, Contains, Partial Match, Starts With or Ends With) and pick what to send: a text, media, template, catalogue, sequence, chatbot or form. Click Create Action.

Step 11: Build a chatbot with the Flow Builder

Open WhatsApp → Flow Builder and click Create New Flow. Start from Templates (ready flows for clinics, travel, restaurants, real estate, coaching, online stores, lead qualification and more), describe the bot you need to Build with AI, or drag steps onto the canvas yourself.

• Start Trigger: start the flow when a message exactly matches, contains or starts with your keywords, on any message, or when an order is received.
• Messages: Text Message, Button Message (up to 3 buttons), List Message (up to 10 options), Call To Action, Media / PDF, Location and Multi Message.
• Collect data: Ask Question saves the answer to the contact, and Send Form opens a WhatsApp Form.
• Logic: Filter, Wait / Delay, Transform, Add Tag and Update Contact.
• Business actions: Notify Team, Send to CRM, Payment Link and Webhook.
• AI: AI Agent and AI Response steps answer free-text questions.

Use Preview to chat with the bot without sending anything, Test to send it to your own number, then Save Flow. A new flow is switched on when you first save it, and you can turn it on or off from the flow list. The run history icon shows when the flow ran and why a step failed. Use Export and Import to copy flows. Full walkthrough: how to build a WhatsApp chatbot without coding.

Step 12: Add AI

• AI Config (sidebar): choose an AI model and add your API key, then Save Changes. This powers AI template writing and AI reply suggestions in the inbox.
• Reply Materials → Chatbot: create an AI chatbot with your business name and description and train it on text, documents (PDF, CSV, XLSX, TXT), your website URL and question-and-answer pairs. Send it from a Keyword Action, or use the AI Agent step in a flow.
• Saved Answers: write fixed answers to common questions ("Customer asks → Answer sent") so frequent questions are answered without AI.

AI usage counts towards your plan's AI prompts. Learn more on the AI support agent page.

Step 13: Collect details with WhatsApp Forms

If your plan includes WhatsApp Forms, open WhatsApp → Form Builder and click New Form. Choose a category (for example Lead Generation, Appointment Booking, Survey or Contact Us), set colours and the success message, and add fields: text, text area, number, email, phone, date, dropdown, single choice and checkbox. Publish it to Meta, then send it from a flow (Send Form step) or a Keyword Action. Answers appear under View Submissions and can create contacts automatically. See WhatsApp Forms.

Step 14: Take appointment bookings

Open CRM & Contacts → Appointments. On the Services tab click Create Service and set the name, duration, buffer time, price, location, available days and start and end times. Collect booking requests on WhatsApp with an Appointment Booking form or a chatbot, then book the slot with Book Appointment: choose the service and date, and only free time slots are offered. Confirm, complete or cancel each booking from the list. See appointment booking.

Step 15: Find new leads and email them

• Lead Generation → Find Leads: enter a business type and a city, choose how many results (up to 60) and click Search. Tick "Look for an email on each business website" to also find emails. Filter the results, download them as CSV or Excel, or click Save as leads to add them to your contacts with the tag "Google Maps leads".
• Lead Generation → Email Leads: connect your own email account under "Connect your email (SMTP)" with host, port, username, password, from name and from email, and click Test and save. Then choose a tag, write a subject and message ({{name}} becomes the business name) and click Send email. Up to 500 contacts with an email address per send, one email per second.

Before sending WhatsApp marketing templates to new leads, get their permission. Details in how to find business leads on Google Maps.

Step 16: Add your team

First create a team in CRM & Contacts → Teams with Add New Team and choose what its members can see and do. Then open Agents → Add New Agent, enter the agent's name, email, password (at least 6 characters) and phone, and assign the team. You can hide customers' phone numbers from agents. Agents log in with Agent selected on the login page. The number of agents depends on your plan.

Track deals in Pipeline (create stages and drag cards between them) and give agents work in Tasks with priority, status and due date.

Step 17: Sell on WhatsApp

• Catalogues: link your Meta product catalogue and manage products, so customers can browse and order in WhatsApp (plan feature).
• Orders: see orders as a list or a pipeline (Pending, Confirmed, Ready to Ship, On the Way, Delivered) and send an automatic WhatsApp message when the status changes.
• Store Integrations: connect Shopify (store domain and Admin API access token) or WooCommerce (store URL, consumer key and secret), sync products and orders, and turn on abandoned cart recovery.
• Webhooks: get a URL that receives data from any other app, and map it to an approved template to send a WhatsApp message automatically.

Step 18: Automate Instagram

If your plan includes Instagram, open Instagram → Connect and click Connect Instagram Account. Then use the Instagram Inbox for DMs, Comment Automation and Post Automations to reply to comments or DM people who comment a keyword, Welcome DM, Keyword Triggers, AI Auto-Reply, Lead Collection, Drip Sequences, the DM Flow Builder, Campaigns and Analytics. See Instagram & Facebook.

Step 19: Bring website visitors to WhatsApp

WhatsApp → Tools has a WhatsApp Website Widget (set the header, welcome message, button label, your number, a pre-filled message and position, then copy the embed code into your website) and a WhatsApp Link Generator that creates a short wa.me link and QR code for your ads, visiting cards and shop counter. You can also change the inbox colours in Chat Theme.

Step 20: For developers

• Developer: create an API key with Create API Key and send messages, templates, campaigns and contacts from your own software using the x-api-key header. Each section has examples.
• Platform Webhooks: get notified at your URL when a message is received or sent, a contact is created or updated, a campaign is sent or completed, a flow runs and more. Use Send test request to check it.
• OTP Service: send one-time passwords on WhatsApp from your app, with logs, OTP length, message, allowed domains and a test mode.

Troubleshooting

• I can't type a reply in a chat: the 24-hour window has closed. Click Send Template and send an approved template; when the customer replies, you can chat freely again.
• My template was rejected: don't put variables at the very start or end of the body, give realistic examples, match the category to the content (offers are Marketing), and avoid misleading or prohibited content. Edit and submit again.
• Contacts failed to import: download the error log from Import Jobs. Usually the phone number is missing the country code or has the wrong number of digits.
• Messages are not delivered: check the number's quality rating and your Meta payment method, and send only to people who opted in.
• A chatbot does not start: check the flow is switched on in the flow list and the trigger keywords match what customers type. Use the run history icon to see why a step failed.
• AI suggestions don't work: add a model and API key in AI Config and check your plan still has AI prompts left.

Still stuck? Contact us and we will help you set it up.