Skip to main content
New

WhatsApp Coexistence — Messages automatically marked as "read" on WhatsApp Business App, preventing tracking of unhandled conversations

Related product area:WhatsApp
  • June 20, 2026
  • 0 comments
  • 7 views
Arthur Wavy

Hello,

Since connecting my number via WhatsApp Coexistence, every incoming message gets automatically marked as "read" in WhatsApp Business App as soon as Manychat's automation processes and replies to it — even though I haven't opened the conversation myself. This makes it impossible to track which conversations a human still needs to review.

Other users have reported the same issue on the Manychat Community (e.g. "whatsapp coexistence- all messages are marked as read on the phone," Sept 2025, still unanswered).

Is there a setting or fix to prevent this, or can this be logged as a feature request?

Thanks,

    SumGenius
    Forum|alt.badge.img
    • SumGenius
    • Smooth talker
    • July 8, 2026

    This one isn't really a ManyChat bug you can toggle off, it's how WhatsApp Coexistence works, which is probably why it's gone unanswered since September.

    Coexistence keeps a permanent two-way sync between the Cloud API and your WhatsApp Business App. When the automation processes and replies to an incoming message through the API, that message gets marked read on the API side, and the two-way sync mirrors that read state straight back to your Business App. So it shows read on your phone even though you never opened it. No ManyChat setting stops it, because the read status is being synced at the WhatsApp platform level, not set by ManyChat.

    You can still log it as a feature request, but I wouldn't hold your launch on it. The realistic fix is to stop using read/unread as your "needs a human" signal, since Coexistence will always mark them read, and track it inside the automation instead:
    - Tag conversations that got an automated reply separately from ones that need a human, and build your review queue off that tag, not the unread dot.

    - Add a handoff step so when a conversation needs you, it tags it (or pings you) and drops it into a "needs review" segment you can filter to.

    That way it doesn't matter that the phone marks everything read, your to-do list lives in the tags. Happy to walk you through setting that up if you DM me.

    Community Terms & ConditionsAccessibility statement