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Hi everyone!

I’m building an automation system for Instagram using Manychat and an external AI flow via n8n.

Here’s how it works:

  • When someone messages us on Instagram, it triggers a webhook.

  • That webhook sends the message to n8n.

  • n8n uses a RAG system to generate a smart reply and sends it back to the user via Manychat.

So far, so good — but here’s my challenge:

Sometimes our team replies directly to users through the Instagram app (not through Manychat’s Live Chat). When that happens, I want the automation to pause for a set period (e.g., 2 hours) so the bot doesn’t interfere with the human conversation.

I thought of using the “Pause automations during conversations” feature under Live Chat settings, but it seems it only works if the reply is sent from within Manychat’s Live Chat — which is not our case.

Has anyone found a workaround for this?

Is there any way for Manychat to detect when a message is sent by a human agent outside the platform (e.g., from the Instagram mobile app) and pause automations accordingly?

Any suggestions or creative solutions are more than welcome 🙌

Thanks in advance!

Hey ​@nocodedude 

So this is the key here:

Is there any way for Manychat to detect when a message is sent by a human agent outside the platform (e.g., from the Instagram mobile app) and pause automations accordingly?

This is not currently possible.

So you have 2 alternatives:

  1. Use the Live Chat in Manychat
  2. Build an automation that will trigger a flow for the user in Manychat, and use the Pause Automations action to turn off the bot for the time you’d like. This of course will require your agents to do an extra step (like filling in a form with the IG username and clicking a button, for example).

Those are the 2 viable workarounds I know of…

Hope this helps!

Thanks, ​@Gustavo Boregio !

To be honest, I was already assuming it was just an app limitation — nothing major. Just to confirm: even if the automation is set as the default auto-reply for IG messages, it will still pause if the client uses the live chat, right?

I’ll likely just recommend they install the iOS app and use that as their main communication channel.

​@nocodedude yeap it’ll still pause if they’re using Live Chat, so that’s the way to go ;)

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