KakaoTalk messaging

KakaoTalk connects to Arino One as an on-request channel: you request activation under Settings → Channels on your instance, and Arino handles the Infobip and Kakao-side provisioning — registering your KakaoTalk Channel and wiring it to your instance — or you provision it yourself on your own Infobip account and connect the credentials. Once live, KakaoTalk behaves like any other channel in the shared inbox, in automations and in campaigns.

Availability is country-dependent. KakaoTalk is only a viable channel where it has real adoption, in the same way LINE is viable in Japan and Taiwan and Viber varies by country. Confirm the channel is used in your target markets before building on it.

What KakaoTalk is

KakaoTalk is the dominant messaging app in South Korea, used by effectively the whole population, with limited relevance elsewhere. Businesses communicate through a registered KakaoTalk Channel that users can add as a friend, and messages support text, images, buttons and link-outs to your own web surfaces.

Korea-centric reach

There is no technical barrier to enabling KakaoTalk from outside Korea, but the practical constraint is audience. Outside the Korean market, follower and recipient volumes are small enough that the channel rarely justifies the setup and template maintenance work. Confirm that the customers you actually serve use KakaoTalk, and keep WhatsApp or SMS as the primary channel elsewhere.

Template-led messaging

Business messaging on KakaoTalk is template-led. Notification and marketing messages — the Alimtalk-style traffic most businesses send — must be pre-registered as templates and approved before you can use them. Approval covers the content and its category, so transactional notifications and promotional messages are treated differently and are subject to different rules.

Free-form chat is limited to windows opened by the user: once a person messages your Channel, your agents can reply conversationally in the shared inbox for the duration of that window. Outside a window, approved templates are the only route.

Plan for this: template registration is upfront work, and template changes need re-approval, so keep your template set small and parameterised rather than writing one template per campaign.

Activating KakaoTalk on your instance

1. Confirm KakaoTalk is relevant to your audience and that you have, or can create, a business identity for the Korean market.
2. Open Settings → Channels on your Arino One instance and request KakaoTalk activation.
3. Arino coordinates the Infobip and Kakao-side provisioning: registering your KakaoTalk Channel and connecting it to your instance. If you prefer, you can provision the channel directly on your own Infobip account and hand over the credentials.
4. Register your first templates and wait for approval.
5. Send yourself a test message and reply from the app to confirm two-way routing into the shared inbox.

As with every channel, the underlying account is yours: each Arino One client uses their own Infobip account and pays Infobip directly. Arino manages the connection, not the account.

Consent and opt-out

Adding your Channel as a friend, and any consent you capture at signup, is the opt-in; blocking your Channel or unsubscribing is the opt-out. Both are reflected on the contact record so blocked users are excluded from future sends. Keep consent records per channel — a KakaoTalk recipient has not consented to SMS marketing.

Billing

The channel connection and its ongoing management are covered by the flat $50/month Arino Core connection. Message volume is not: KakaoTalk traffic is billed on your own Infobip account at Kakao's rates, which differ between notification, marketing and free-chat traffic. See billing and plans for how usage is charged and channels and senders billing for channel-level costs.

Frequently asked