What happened
WhatsApp is adding usernames. A person who picks one, say @dana.k, is shown by that name instead of their phone number. Meta says it will roll them out gradually during 2026 and has not named dates or countries.
For people, that is a privacy feature. For a business, it means a customer can message you and you may not see their number. Meta has been preparing the systems that businesses use for this since April, and its developer documentation is blunt: every business on the WhatsApp Business Platform has to support it, or risk not being able to handle these customers' messages at all.
What is actually new
Three changes sit behind the headline. Only the first is about usernames themselves.
- A new ID for every customer. Since April 2026 each incoming message carries an ID that belongs to that customer and your business only. It is there whether or not the customer has a username, so it is the one thing that is always present.
- The number can be missing. If the customer has a username, Meta leaves out their number unless your business messaged or heard from it in the last 30 days, or the customer is in your WhatsApp contact book. The 30 days count per business number.
- Replies can go to the ID. Since July 2026 a business can answer a customer with only the ID. The exception is login codes: one-tap, zero-tap and copy-code authentication messages still need a phone number.
Two smaller additions came with it. A customer who changes their number gets a new ID, and Meta sends a message that links the old one to the new. And a business can now add a button that asks the customer to share their number.
Where your business feels it
Not in the chat itself. In everything around it that assumes a WhatsApp customer is a phone number.
- The inbox. A tool that files conversations by phone number has nowhere to put a customer without one. At best the message shows up as a stranger. At worst it never arrives.
- Your customer records. A CRM or store that finds a customer by phone won't recognise them, so a returning customer looks new and their order history doesn't come up.
- Anything that needs the number. Calling back, sending an SMS, a booking that requires a phone, login codes. The customer can still give you their number. You just can't assume you have it.
What it doesn’t change
- Your own number stays visible. If your business claims a username, customers still see your number on your profile. A business username is a name to be found by, not a way to hide.
- How you talk to customers. The chat, the 24-hour window and templates work as before. Customers with a username can still message you and get answers.
- Nothing changes overnight. Usernames arrive in stages, and a customer only hides their number by choosing one.
What to do this month
- Ask whoever connects your WhatsApp one question: "Do you handle customers who have a username and no phone number?" A yes should come with what happens to their conversation and their customer record. On AssistantLabs, these customers are already handled. Their conversation and contact are kept under that ID and joined to the number when it appears.
- Check what matches customers by phone. Your store, your CRM, a spreadsheet, a booking system. Decide what happens when a customer has no number, before it happens.
- Ask for the number when you need it. If a booking or a delivery needs a phone, have your agent ask for it in the conversation, the way it would ask for an address.
- Claim your business's username. It's optional and doesn't hide your number, but names are unique across all of WhatsApp. See Claim a WhatsApp username for your business.
One thing not to do: don't clear out old contacts to "clean up". Meta keeps sending a customer's number only for recent chats and for people in your contact book, and a customer who comes back without one is recognised only if their record already holds the ID.
How to read the next one
Meta's page says everything in it is subject to change, and it has changed several times since spring. A few questions sort out most updates.
- Is it about people or businesses? Coverage of usernames is mostly about privacy for users. The business change is a different story, and it is the one that affects you.
- Is there a date, and where? "Gradually in 2026" is not a launch date. Wait for one before you change anything that works today.
- Who has to do the work? Most of it falls on whoever connects your WhatsApp. Your part is to ask, and to check your own systems.