What Is Branded WhatsApp OTP? (And How It Works on MiniMoth)

If you’ve used WhatsApp OTP login on a well-known app, you’ve probably noticed the message arrives from that app’s WhatsApp Business Account — its name, its logo, its verified checkmark. That’s branded WhatsApp OTP, and it’s now something you can set up on MiniMoth for your own project, without switching providers or rebuilding your OTP flow.

What is branded WhatsApp OTP?

Branded WhatsApp OTP is when the one-time passcode message a user receives over WhatsApp comes from your own WhatsApp Business Account, not a shared sender. Instead of seeing a generic provider name in their WhatsApp inbox, your users see your business — your name, your profile photo, your verified badge if you have one. The code itself works exactly the same way; what changes is who the message visibly comes from.

This matters most once a product is far enough along that a shared sender name starts feeling like it undercuts an otherwise polished login experience — a user mid-signup, watching for a message from your app, seeing a different name arrive in its place.

How does it work on MiniMoth?

MiniMoth uses Meta’s own infrastructure for this — specifically, Meta’s Embedded Signup flow for WhatsApp Business Accounts. Connecting your own account is a three-step process, done once per project from your MiniMoth dashboard:

1. Connect your account. Sign in with Meta and link your WhatsApp Business Account to your MiniMoth project.
2. Register your phone number. The number you want OTPs to send from gets registered with Meta’s Cloud API.
3. Get your OTP template approved. MiniMoth creates the authentication message template your account will send; Meta reviews and approves it.

Once all three steps are done, you flip a single toggle to switch delivery from MiniMoth’s shared account to your own. Nothing about your integration code changes — you’re still calling the same otp/send and otp/verify endpoints you always have. The only difference is which WhatsApp Business Account the message comes from.

You can switch back to shared delivery at any time without disconnecting or redoing any of the three setup steps.

What happens if the branded WhatsApp send fails? (SMS fallback)

Every OTP MiniMoth sends — branded or not — falls back to SMS automatically if WhatsApp delivery fails. Branded WhatsApp OTP doesn’t change this: if a message sent from your own WhatsApp Business Account doesn’t go through, MiniMoth retries over SMS within seconds, using MiniMoth’s own DLT-registered sender. Your users still get their code either way; the fallback is invisible to your integration code and requires no extra handling on your end.

How is branded WhatsApp OTP billed?

Because the message sends through your own WhatsApp Business Account, Meta bills you directly for that send, separate from MiniMoth’s own per-OTP rate. MiniMoth charges a small facilitation fee on top for handling the send. If a message falls back to SMS, that portion is billed at MiniMoth’s normal SMS rate, same as any other project. See Pricing for current rates.

Do you have to use it?

No — this is entirely optional. Every MiniMoth project already sends OTPs over WhatsApp first with automatic SMS fallback, using MiniMoth’s own shared account, with zero setup required. Connecting your own WhatsApp Business Account is something you can add to an existing project later, whenever your own branding on the delivery layer starts to matter to you — see Why Your OTP Doesn’t Need Your Brand Name for the case for not rushing into it.

To set it up, open a project in your MiniMoth dashboard and find the WhatsApp Business Account card.