Inbox: who is replying and how to step in

Chats holds every conversation your bots have, both Telegram and Instagram. You can see what the bot answered, and you can step in and write yourself.

Until there is anything, the section says: “Nothing here yet”.

The list on the left

A row shows the user’s photo, their name with the network icon beside it, the last line and, on the right, the time and the unread count. Next to the network icon there is a small round photo of your account that handles the conversation — so you can see which one it is. Your own last line starts with “You:”. If the last message was not text, its kind is shown instead: “Photo”, “Video”, “Voice message”, “File”, “Sticker”, “Reel”, “Story”, “Reaction”.

On Instagram, a user’s photo appears once they message you directly: for someone who only left a comment, Instagram gives out neither photo nor name — a badge with the first letter of the name is shown instead. Tap the photo on the user’s card to open it full size.

At the top: search (“Find a conversation…”) and the switch between All chats and Unread only. Search looks at names and at the text of the messages: found replies are listed under the matching conversations, and a tap opens the chat right at that message.

The row also shows where the word was found: if it is in the message, you see the piece around it instead of the start of the message; if it is in the name, the name itself is picked out; and if it is in the username, the row shows @username instead of the message. The word found is always picked out in colour.

On a wide screen

On a computer, Chats opens as two parts at once, like Telegram Desktop: the list of conversations with search and folders on the left, the open conversation on the right. On entry you see the one you worked with last time, or the first in the list if it is gone. A click on a row on the left switches the conversation on the right. With no conversations, the right side says “Select a chat”.

Use folders to narrow the list (see below). If nothing matches a folder or the search, the list says “Nothing found”.

Folders

Above the list there is a row of folders: a settings gear at the start of the row, then the folders themselves. A folder is your own selection of chats: tap one and the list shows only what fits it. You can also swipe the list left or right to open the next folder. The number on a folder is how many unread chats it holds.

Three folders are ready from the start: “Direct” (chats with at least one direct message — from the user to you or from you to them), “All” (including those who only left a comment) and “No bot” (chats you took over). “Direct” and “No bot” show up in the row only when there is at least one chat in them. They are ordinary folders — rename, reorder or delete them as you like.

Once you connect a second account, a folder for each account appears on its own — both in Chats and in Contacts — and takes the first place in the row. Such a folder shows in the row as two circles instead of a word: the network icon and the account photo. Any folder of yours can look that way too — pick a single account in its conditions and turn on “Show as account”. Rename or delete such a folder as you like: a deleted one is never brought back by us.

The settings button opens the list of folders: tap a folder to edit it. “Add a folder” is always there under the list. In the app, “Restore the default folders” appears after “Edit” at the top right; in the browser the button sits under the list. Restoring asks you to confirm first: it brings those three folders back if you deleted them, and your own folders stay where they are. Close the settings and edit mode switches itself off — next time the list opens as usual.

A folder has a name and conditions — each condition is a row: tap it and pick a value. Conditions add up: a chat lands in the folder when it matches all of them.

• Messages — “All” or “Direct”. “Direct” means chats with at least one direct message either way; comments without a conversation are not included.
• Automation — “Any”, “Automation on”, “Automation off”.
• Unread — only chats with something unread.
• Only with chats — the folder shows in the row only when at least one chat matches its conditions; an empty one leaves the row but stays in the list of folders, where you can turn the switch off.
• Accounts — chats of the accounts you pick.
• Channel — “Any”, Instagram, Telegram.
• Reply window — “Any”, “Open”, “Closed”.
• Last reply — “Any”, “Mine”, “Theirs”.
• Tags — users carrying the tags you pick.

Leave a condition untouched and the folder simply ignores it. Under the conditions you can see how many conversations match them right now. The name and conditions are saved with “Done” (“Save” in the browser); go back without it and the folder stays as it was. To change the order of folders in the row, open the list of folders, tap “Edit”, press and hold a folder and drag it to its new place. To delete a folder, swipe its row to the left and tap “Delete” (in the browser — the circle next to the row in edit mode): deleting a folder removes the selection only — the conversations stay where they are.

Marking chats as read

At the top of Chats there is Edit — both in the app and in the browser on a phone. Tap it and every conversation gets a circle: tick the ones you need and tap “Read (3)” at the bottom. Tick nothing and the bottom button marks everything currently in the list — “Read all” (the selected folder and filters count). There is no deleting in this mode. Tap Done where Edit was to leave it; switching a folder, opening folder settings or starting a search also leaves the mode and then does its own job.

Who is running the conversation

Under each message it says whose it is:

• “scenario replied” — your bot answered by its own steps;
• “Bot · Name” — a message from that particular bot;
• “Chain «Name»” — a message from a chain;
• “you replied” — you wrote it by hand;
• “Scriptera note” — on the free plan a short note of ours is added to conversations of bots built from templates; broadcasts and chains do not get it.

Grey lines in the thread are events: “Came from link «profile bio»”, “Came from an Instagram link”, “Came from an Instagram ad”, “Tags: +left a phone number”, “Saved: phone — …”, “Scenario «…» takes over”, “You took over the conversation”, “Conversation handed back to the scenario”, “Broadcast sent”, and skipped chain messages.

Two more lines explain a bot’s silence:

• “Looks like a loop: the bot is pausing in this conversation” — the guard that keeps a user from getting a hundred messages in a row;
• “The bot didn’t write: Instagram only lets a bot message after the user sends a message or taps a button”.

Replying yourself

At the bottom of a conversation is the Reply personally… box. Next to it:

• Attach a file — a photo, a video, a document;
• voice recording: “Record a voice message”, “Send voice message”, “Cancel recording”. If the microphone is blocked — “Microphone unavailable. Allow audio recording in your browser.”

While a message is on its way it is marked “sending”; once it is delivered and read, “Seen”. If it fails — “Not sent” plus the reason: “the reply window is closed”, “the account is disconnected”, “the user blocked the bot”, “the platform rejected the file”, “the platform rejected the message”.

Turning automation off

While you are dealing with someone yourself, the bot should not butt in. The Turn automation off button stops the bot for that one user:

Turn automation off in this conversation? The bot will stop replying to this user — you reply yourself until you turn it back on.

After that a reminder sits at the top — “Automation off — the bot does not reply here” — and Turn automation on brings everything back. In the list such a conversation is tagged “automation off”, and you can filter by it.

When you cannot write

• The reply window is closed (Instagram). “Instagram only allows writing to a user for 24 hours after their last message. Once they write again, the reply box opens up.” While there is time left, the line above the box reads “You can still reply for 3 h 20 min”.
• The exception — a recent comment. If the last thing from the user is a comment under your post, Instagram lets you send them one private message within 7 days of the comment. The reply box is open with the note “One message in reply to the comment” above it. Text only — no images, files or buttons. Once sent, the box closes until the user writes or comments again.
• The account is disconnected. “This bot’s account is disconnected — you can’t write. Connect it again in Connections and the conversation comes back to life.”
• The user blocked the bot. “If they unblock and write, the box comes back.”

Instagram conversations take a while to arrive

Right after you connect Instagram, the history comes in batches: conversations show up in the list on their own as they arrive. If the refresh fails — “Could not refresh the list — this is what it looked like earlier.”

Instagram sometimes will not hand over old messages at all; in their place you see: “Older message, Instagram no longer provides it.”

Read next

• The user’s card — labels, where they came from, “Do not message”.
• One-off broadcast — how to write to many users at once.