Zalo messaging
Zalo connects to Arino One as an on-request channel: you request activation under Settings → Channels on your instance and Arino coordinates the Infobip and Zalo-side provisioning of your Official Account, or you provision it yourself on your own Infobip account and connect the credentials. Once live, Zalo behaves like any other channel in the shared inbox, in automations and in campaigns.
Availability is country-dependent. Zalo 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 Zalo is
Zalo is the dominant messaging app in Vietnam, with near-universal reach there and little relevance elsewhere. Businesses communicate through a Zalo Official Account that users follow, and messages support text, images, buttons and structured notification layouts.
Vietnam-centric reach
Nothing technically prevents you from enabling Zalo from outside Vietnam, but the practical constraint is audience. Outside the Vietnamese market, follower and recipient volumes are small enough that the setup and template maintenance rarely justify themselves. Confirm your customers actually use Zalo in the countries you serve, and keep WhatsApp or SMS as the primary channel elsewhere.
Official Accounts, ZNS templates and sessions
Business messaging on Zalo runs through your Official Account and splits into two modes.
Notification traffic uses ZNS (Zalo Notification Service) templates: pre-registered, approved message layouts for things like order confirmations, appointment reminders and OTPs. Registration and approval are required before a template can be sent, content and category are reviewed, and template edits need re-approval — the same discipline as WhatsApp message templates.
Session messaging is conversational: when a user messages your Official Account they open a window in which your agents can reply freely from the shared inbox. Outside that window, approved templates are the only route.
Plan for this: keep a small set of parameterised ZNS templates rather than one per campaign, so approval work does not become the bottleneck.
Activating Zalo on your instance
- Confirm Zalo is relevant to your audience and that you have, or can create, a business identity for the Vietnamese market.
- Open Settings → Channels on your Arino One instance and request Zalo activation.
- Arino coordinates the Infobip and Zalo-side provisioning of your Official Account and connects it to your instance. Alternatively, provision it directly on your own Infobip account and hand over the credentials.
- Register your first ZNS templates and wait for approval.
- Send yourself a test notification 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
Following your Official Account, and any consent you capture at signup, is the opt-in; unfollowing or blocking is the opt-out, and both are reflected on the contact record so blocked users are excluded from future sends. Keep consent records per channel — a Zalo follower 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: Zalo traffic is billed on your own Infobip account at Zalo's rates, which differ between ZNS notifications and session messaging. See billing and plans for how usage is charged.
Frequently asked
How do I connect Zalo to Arino One?
Zalo is an on-request channel. Request activation under Settings → Channels on your instance and Arino coordinates the Infobip and Zalo-side provisioning of your Official Account, or provision it yourself on your own Infobip account and connect the credentials.
Who can I message on Zalo?
Users who follow your Official Account, or who have opened a session by messaging you. Notification traffic to known users goes through approved ZNS templates; free-form replies are limited to user-initiated session windows. There is no cold messaging.
Is Zalo useful outside Vietnam?
Rarely. Adoption is concentrated in Vietnam, where Zalo is the dominant messaging app. Outside that market the reachable audience is small enough that the channel seldom pays for itself — confirm your customers use Zalo before building on it.
What approval do ZNS templates need?
Every ZNS notification template must be registered and approved by Zalo before it can be sent, with content and category reviewed much like WhatsApp message templates. Changes require re-approval, and the timeline is outside Arino's control.
Apply this to your own deployment
This guide describes decisions we make on live instances. Tell us your channels, systems and region and we will map it to an architecture outline, a provisioning plan and an indicative commercial model — usually within one business day.