How are messages and conversations billed?

Messages and conversations are paid directly to Infobip and Meta on your own Infobip account. Arino never bills for messages, never marks them up, and never acts as a messaging reseller. This article explains what drives your messaging cost and how to monitor it; for the figures Arino does charge, see billing and plans, which is the single canonical rate card.

Arino never bills your messages

This is the most common point of confusion, so it is worth stating first. Every Arino One client owns their own Infobip account — on the Remix route you create it during onboarding, on the BYO route you already have it. Infobip invoices you for traffic, and Meta bills the WhatsApp conversation fees. Arino is not in the middle of that relationship at any point.

The only charges Arino ever raises are the flat $350 setup fee if you chose the We build it for you option, the optional $50/month Arino Core connection, WebRTC minutes at $0.009 while connected, and Ping Me hardware and usage. Messaging is not on that list, and it is not on it under any route, build option or connection status.

A practical consequence: because you hold the Infobip contract, you also benefit from your own volume rates or negotiated terms rather than someone else's blended pricing.

What the optional $50/month does and doesn't touch

The $50/month Arino Core connection is optional. It covers instance connection and management, unlimited seats, unlimited live web chat, the platform and GDPR features from setup, and access to WebRTC calling. It has no effect whatsoever on message pricing — connected or unconnected, your messages cost exactly the same and are billed by exactly the same providers.

WhatsApp conversation categories

WhatsApp doesn't charge per message — it charges per 24-hour conversation, categorised by Meta as:

• Marketing — promotional content, offers, product updates
• Utility — transactional updates tied to an existing transaction (order confirmations, shipping updates)
• Authentication — one-time passcodes and identity verification
• Service — replies within the free customer-service window opened by the customer

Once a conversation window opens in a given category, every message exchanged inside it is covered by that single conversation charge — you are not billed again per message until a new 24-hour window opens. Sending outside an existing window with a template message opens (and charges) a new conversation. Rates vary by category and by the customer's country, which is why the console shows spend broken down by category rather than a single blended rate.

SMS segments

SMS is billed per segment rather than per message. A standard GSM-encoded message fits roughly 160 characters into one segment; longer messages, or messages using characters outside the GSM alphabet (such as emoji or certain accented characters), split into multiple segments and are billed accordingly. Destination country also affects the per-segment rate significantly, since it reflects the receiving network's charges.

Other metered channels

Email and other channels follow the same principle — charged at the underlying provider rate for volume sent, directly on your Infobip account. Voice/WebRTC minutes and Ping Me usage are the exception in that Arino does bill them; they have their own dedicated pricing and are covered in voice and WebRTC billing and Ping Me billing rather than here.

Where each cost lands

Reading usage in the console

Open the console and go to Account → Usage. Usage is broken down by channel (WhatsApp, SMS, email, voice, Ping Me) and, for WhatsApp, further by conversation category. Figures update through the period so you can track spend before your Infobip invoice arrives rather than being surprised by it. Your Infobip console remains the authoritative record for messaging charges, since Infobip is the party billing them.

Spend alerts

Under Account → Usage → Alerts, set a monthly threshold per channel. When cumulative spend crosses that threshold, all account administrators receive an email notification. This is particularly useful for catching a misconfigured automation that sends far more messages than intended — a spend alert usually surfaces the problem well before the Infobip invoice does. Alerts are advisory only; crossing a threshold does not pause sending, so pair alerts with your own Infobip-side controls if you need a hard stop on spend.

For the rates Arino charges, and how setup and the optional monthly connection are structured, see billing and plans.

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