EliteTeQ API · early access · connect your systems to WhatsApp
Your POS, online shop or app sends the WhatsApp message; your team sees it, and every reply, in EliteTeQ Inbox.
The EliteTeQ API connects your own software to the WhatsApp Business number in your inbox. Send order updates and receipts with approved templates, add leads from your website, and get a webhook the moment a customer writes back. There is no Meta developer app to set up yourself: the number is already connected in EliteTeQ Inbox. It works with your +251 number and customers anywhere in Ethiopia.
Free sandbox · API in early access
WhatsApp or call +1 214 423 5355 · a person replies, usually in under 10 minutes
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curl -X POST https://crm.eliteteqpos.com/api/v1/contacts/{id}/messages \
-H "Authorization: Bearer et_live_…" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"template": {"name": "order_ready",
"params": ["Selam", "#1042"]}}'201 Created
{ "object": "message", "status": "sent" }Real screen · demo workspace with example data
Our POS knows when an order is ready, but someone still types the WhatsApp message.
EliteTeQ Inbox
Your POS calls the API with an approved template, such as order_ready, and the customer gets it at once. The message and any reply show in the inbox for your team.
Leads from our website form never reach the WhatsApp team.
EliteTeQ Inbox
Add each lead with the API. It lands on the pipeline in the first stage, with its source, ready for a teammate to message.
Our system has no idea what customers say on WhatsApp.
EliteTeQ Inbox
Subscribe to the message.received webhook. Every customer message is posted to your system, signed so you know it came from EliteTeQ, and retried if your server is down.
Your team should talk to customers, not retype receipts.
The EliteTeQ API connects your POS, online shop or app to the WhatsApp Business number already in your inbox.
Messages your system sends, and every customer reply, show in EliteTeQ Inbox, so your team can pick up the conversation.
Less copying and pasting. More time for customers.
Start in the SandboxWith EliteTeQ Inbox, you can
The EliteTeQ API lets your own software use the WhatsApp Business number connected to EliteTeQ Inbox in Ethiopia. With an API key you can add and update contacts, move them through pipeline stages, send text messages or approved WhatsApp templates, read message history, and receive signed webhooks when customers write, read or reply. Plans start with a free sandbox; API Starter is $29 a month for 50,000 requests.
| Product | EliteTeQ Inbox, by EliteTeQ Softwares Limited (Nairobi, Kenya) |
|---|---|
| What it is | A WhatsApp team inbox and CRM |
| Channels | WhatsApp Business (official Cloud API, works alongside the WhatsApp Business app), Facebook Messenger, Instagram DMs, Facebook and Instagram comments |
| Works on | Any browser; installs on Android and iPhone |
| Price | From $29 a month; $59 Growth; $99 Business with unlimited people; a year costs 10 months |
| Free trial | 7 days, every feature open |
| WhatsApp numbers | 1 to 3 included by plan; up to 20 per business (Meta’s limit once the business is verified with Meta) |
| In Ethiopia | +251 WhatsApp Business numbers, office hours on Addis Ababa time (EAT) |
| Languages | Customers write in Amharic, Afaan Oromo and English |
| Setup | About 40 minutes, or done with you on WhatsApp |
| Last reviewed | 2026-11-01 |
The same inbox your team uses, reachable from your code.
Send a text inside the 24-hour window, or an approved template any time: order ready, payment received, delivery on the way. The answer tells you if it was sent, is waiting, or failed and why.
Real screen · demo workspace with example data
Create and update contacts, set their stage, category and tags, or update many at once. Your CRM, shop or website and the inbox stay the same.
Real screen · demo workspace with example data
Webhooks post to your server when a contact is created or updated, a chat is assigned, or a message is received, sent, delivered, read or fails.
Real screen · demo workspace with example data
Free sandbox · API in early access
The API is in early access: message us and we switch it on for your account.
In Settings → Developers, create an et_test_ key with only the permissions you need. Test keys check everything but never save or send.
Use the API reference with its built-in console, the OpenAPI file or the Postman collection.
Swap in an et_live_ key. Messages now go to real customers from your connected WhatsApp number.
See every request with its ID, and test or resend webhooks, in Settings → Developers.
A shared inbox helps your team see messages. EliteTeQ goes further, connecting every conversation to lead management, team coordination and sales visibility.
US dollars a month, on top of any EliteTeQ Inbox plan. The Business plan already includes 10,000 requests a month.
| Plan | Monthly fee | API requests a month | Good for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Developer Sandbox | Free | 1,000 | Build and test with test keys that check everything but never save or send. |
| API Starter | $29 | 50,000 | One integration: your POS, shop or website sending order and receipt messages. |
| API Growth | $99 | 250,000 | Several systems connected, or a busy store syncing contacts all day. |
| API Business | $299 | 1 million | High volume across branches, apps and back-office systems. |
| Enterprise API | Custom | Negotiated | Custom volume, limits and support, agreed with you. |
Every call to the API is one request; webhooks we send you are free. Meta’s charges for WhatsApp template messages are separate. Ask about Enterprise API
The message is the same; nobody has to remember to send it.
| By hand | With the EliteTeQ API |
|---|---|
| Someone copies the order number into WhatsApp | Your system sends the template the moment the order is ready |
| Website leads sit in an email inbox | Each lead lands on the pipeline at once |
| No record of WhatsApp in your own system | Every message arrives by webhook |
| One shared login for the integration | Separate keys, each with only the permissions it needs |
The API sends from your connected +251 WhatsApp Business number, so customers in Ethiopia see your business name as usual. Meta’s charges for template messages are billed to your Meta account, separately from API requests.
In Ethiopia, many customers also use Telegram, which EliteTeQ Inbox does not connect to yet. For businesses in Addis Ababa and beyond that sell on WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram, it puts those chats in one list the whole team shares.
Customers in Ethiopia write in Amharic, Afaan Oromo, Tigrinya and English. Your team replies in the customer’s language inside the 24-hour window; template messages can currently be created in English.
Office hours are set day by day for each number. A common setup in Addis Ababa: weekdays open, Saturday mornings open, Sunday closed. Anyone who writes while you are closed gets your away message, at most once every 12 hours, and the chat waits at the top of the list for the morning.
Customers in Ethiopia pay with telebirr, CBE Birr, M-Pesa, cards and bank transfers, so when a sale closes on WhatsApp the customer may confirm payment in the chat, and your team needs to see that message quickly.
Sidama Region · a lakeside city with a major industrial park
Hawassa combines a lakeside leisure and hospitality trade with a large industrial park, which gives it two distinct customer bases: weekend and holiday visitors, and a substantial wage-earning workforce with regular pay cycles. That makes demand more predictable than in agricultural towns, and rewards systems that handle both fast table service and everyday convenience retail. The industrial park provides a large wage-earning workforce on regular pay cycles while the lakeside draws weekend visitors — two predictable but unrelated demand curves. A shop or distributor in Hawassa can send order and delivery updates straight from its own system.
Addis Ababa · Ethiopia's capital and the seat of the African Union
Addis Ababa concentrates Ethiopia's formal retail, hospitality and institutional trade, with a large diplomatic and international-organisation presence alongside the vast Merkato trading area. Mobile money use is growing quickly alongside cash. Merkato trades at enormous scale while the diplomatic and international-organisation districts carry a quite different basket, and both sit in one city. A shop or distributor in Addis Ababa can send order and delivery updates straight from its own system.
Dire Dawa · an eastern trade and rail city
Dire Dawa is a commercial city on the rail corridor toward Djibouti, which makes import and transit trade a large share of its activity and ties restocking to freight schedules. Cash dominates settlement, with cross-border influence on pricing from the Djibouti corridor. The rail corridor toward Djibouti makes import and transit trade central, tying restocking to freight rather than local demand. A shop or distributor in Dire Dawa can send order and delivery updates straight from its own system.
Reviewed by the EliteTeQ team ·
Not answered here? A person from our team replies on WhatsApp.
Ask a humanEvery call your system makes to the API counts as one request, whether it reads or sends. Webhooks EliteTeQ sends to you don’t count, and Meta’s charges for WhatsApp template messages are separate.
No. It is EliteTeQ’s API on top of the official WhatsApp Business Platform. Your number is connected once in EliteTeQ Inbox, so you don’t need your own Meta developer app, and messages sent through the API appear in the inbox for your team.
Yes. The API works on an active EliteTeQ Inbox account, and API plans are added on top. The Business plan includes 10,000 requests a month.
Yes. Test keys check every request exactly like live keys but never save or send anything, with up to 1,000 requests a month.
Each key allows 120 requests a minute. Above that, the API answers with a rate-limit error and the number of seconds to wait.
A free-form text needs the customer to have written in the last 24 hours on WhatsApp (7 days on Messenger and Instagram). Otherwise send an approved template, and only to customers who agreed to hear from you.
It is in early access. Message us on WhatsApp and we switch it on for your EliteTeQ Inbox account.
Yes. The EliteTeQ API lets software used in Ethiopia send WhatsApp messages from a connected +251 business number, add leads to the pipeline and receive webhooks when customers write. It runs on an EliteTeQ Inbox account: the Business plan includes 10,000 requests a month, and API Starter adds 50,000 for $29 a month.
Yes, with an approved template such as order_ready or delivery_update. Your system calls the API when the order changes, the customer gets the message on WhatsApp, and any reply lands in the inbox for your team. Meta’s charge for the template is billed to your Meta account at its rate for Ethiopian numbers.
WhatsApp rules on this page, from Meta:WhatsApp Business Platform pricing (Meta)Messaging limits (Meta)Message templates (Meta)Business phone numbers and limits (Meta)About the WhatsApp Business Platform (Meta)
The API is in early access. Message us and we’ll switch it on for your account.
Free sandbox · API in early access
Or WhatsApp us on +1 214 423 5355