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A Canned Reply is a saved piece of text your agents can paste into a conversation with one click (or one /shortcut). No AI is involved — the text is stored as-is and inserted as-is. Use canned replies when:
  • The same answer appears in dozens of conversations (“Our hours are…”, “Here’s our pricing PDF…”).
  • You want consistent wording across agents.
  • You need a fast way to handle high-volume questions.
Canned replies are static. If the answer needs to adapt to the customer’s specific question, use an AI Prompt instead.

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Create a canned reply

Go to AI & Replies → Canned Replies.
Canned replies library
1

Click 'Create Canned Reply'

Give it an internal name and a shortcut.
2

Set the shortcut

A short alias starting with / — e.g. /hours, /address, /price. Agents type this in the composer to insert the reply.
3

Write the body

Plain text, with optional variables like {{contact.firstname}}. Use WhatsApp formatting (*bold*, _italic_) if you want.
4

Pick a category

Group related replies — “Support”, “Sales”, “FAQ”.
5

Save

Immediately available to every agent — no reload needed.

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Variables in canned replies

You can personalise a canned reply with these placeholders:
VariableValue
{{contact.firstname}}First name
{{contact.lastname}}Last name
{{contact.phone}}Phone
{{contact.email}}Email
{{contact.custom.<field>}}Any custom field
{{agent.firstname}}First name of the agent pasting the reply
{{workspace.name}}Your workspace name
If a variable is empty (e.g. contact has no first name), Xobito replaces it with nothing. Your "Hi {{contact.firstname}}!" becomes "Hi !". For fields that might be empty, skip the variable or provide a fallback like {{contact.firstname|there}}.

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Using a canned reply

1

Open any conversation

Go to Chat and pick a conversation.
2

Type / in the composer

A picker appears with all your canned replies.
3

Start typing to filter

Type /hours, /pric, /ad — the list filters as you type.
4

Hit Enter or click

The reply body is inserted into the composer. Variables are filled in.
5

Edit if needed, then send

Canned replies are a starting point — edit freely before sending.
Pick short, distinctive shortcuts. /hours is better than /businessOpeningHours. Your agents will remember and type it all day.

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Organising with categories

Once you have 10+ canned replies, categories make the picker navigable. Typical categories:

FAQ

Hours, address, pricing, warranty, returns.

Support

“We’re looking into this”, “Please share a screenshot”, “Can we call you?”

Sales

Price list, demo offer, upgrade link.

Closing

“Thanks for your patience”, “Anything else I can help with?”, “Have a great day”.

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Shortcut conventions

The shortcut is the most important field — it’s what agents actually type. Some conventions that work:
  • One word, lowercase. /hours, not /Business Hours.
  • No spaces. Use _ if you really need a separator: /order_status.
  • Short. 4–10 characters is the sweet spot.
  • Predictable. Use the customer’s vocabulary (/refund) not yours (/rma-policy).

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Editing, duplicating, deleting

  • Edit — changes apply instantly. Conversations already using a pasted copy keep their old text.
  • Duplicate — handy for language variants: duplicate /hours as /hours_es and translate the body.
  • Delete — removes the reply from every agent’s picker. Past usage in conversations stays as regular text.

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Permissions

Staff with the tenant.canned_reply.create and tenant.canned_reply.edit permissions can create and edit. All other staff can still use them in chat. Set this up in Roles & Permissions.

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Multi-language setups

If your team handles conversations in more than one language, there are two patterns:
Duplicate each reply per language and add a language suffix to the shortcut:
  • /hours_en
  • /hours_es
  • /hours_fr
Agents pick the one that matches the conversation language. Good for small teams.

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Best practices

WhatsApp users skim. A canned reply that’s 300 words will feel like a wall of text. Aim for 2–4 short sentences per reply.
Canned replies drift out of date — prices change, hours move, the returns policy gets updated. Put a quarterly calendar reminder to review the library.
"We'll get back to you in 2 hours" becomes a lie the first time your team is swamped. "We'll get back to you shortly" is safer.
Don’t make every canned reply end with “Regards, Team Support”. Sign with the agent’s name: "{{agent.firstname}}". It reads warmer.

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Troubleshooting

  • Are you starting with / (forward slash)?
  • Is the reply saved and not in draft?
  • Is your agent account in a role with the tenant.canned_reply.view permission?
Make sure the variable is spelled exactly — {{contact.firstname}}, not {{contact.first_name}}. Custom-field variables use the field’s slug, not its label.
WhatsApp formatting needs clean asterisks and underscores: *bold* with spaces around. *bold text*works, * bold text * and text*bold*text often don’t.

AI Prompts

For replies that need to respond to the actual customer question.

Live Inbox

Where your canned replies get used.