Campaign and recipient statuses
A campaign is draft, scheduled, running, paused, completed, failed or cancelled. Each recipient is pending, sent, failed or skipped. The important detail is that a recipient counts as sent only when every message in its sequence succeeded — if the first of three messages goes and the second fails, that recipient is failed, not partially sent. That is why the sent count can look lower than the number of messages that actually left.
Campaign statuses
| Status | Meaning | What you can do |
|---|---|---|
| Draft | Created but never started. | Edit anything, then start. |
| Scheduled | Waiting for its send time. | Edit or cancel before it starts. |
| Running | Currently working through recipients. | Pause it. |
| Paused | Stopped part-way. | Resume — already-sent recipients are skipped. |
| Completed | Every recipient has been attempted. | Review results, export the log. |
| Failed | Stopped by an error, such as the device disconnecting. | Fix the cause, then resume or recreate. |
| Cancelled | Stopped deliberately and not resumed. | Nothing — it is finished. |
Completed does not mean everyone received it. It means every recipient was attempted. Some of those attempts may have failed.
Recipient statuses
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Pending | Not attempted yet. |
| Sent | Every message in the sequence succeeded. |
| Failed | At least one message could not be sent. The reason is recorded. |
| Skipped | Deliberately not attempted — for example a daily limit was reached. |
Why "sent" is counted per recipient
A recipient is marked sent only when all the messages in its sequence succeeded. If your campaign has three messages and the second fails for someone, that recipient is failed — even though the first message did arrive.
This is the right way round: what you care about is whether the person received the communication you intended, not how many individual sends technically succeeded. But it does explain a number that surprises people.
Consider a 3-message campaign to 100 recipients where 10 recipients fail on the third message:
| Measure | Value |
|---|---|
| Individual messages that arrived | 290 |
| Recipients shown as sent | 90 |
| Recipients shown as failed | 10 |
The dashboard reports 90, not 290 and not 100. Those 10 people did get the first two messages — check the log before re-sending, or they receive the opening messages twice.
Take care re-running a campaign for failed recipients. A recipient failed on message three has already had messages one and two. Re-sending the whole sequence duplicates them, which is exactly the sort of thing that gets a number reported.
Common failure reasons
| Reason | What it usually means |
|---|---|
| Number not on WhatsApp | Valid number, no account — see checking a number |
| Chat would not open | Malformed number, or WhatsApp Web was slow |
| Media failed to attach | File moved, renamed or deleted since the template was made |
| Session lost | Device disconnected mid-campaign |
| Daily limit reached | Recorded as skipped rather than failed |
Reading the numbers honestly
A campaign that shows 180 sent out of 200 has not necessarily gone badly — 20 of those numbers may simply not be on WhatsApp, which is normal for an older list. What matters is the trend:
- Failures spread evenly across the campaign usually mean list quality.
- Failures clustered at the end usually mean the number started being throttled part-way through — see My WhatsApp number was restricted or banned.
Export the log from Analytics to see the ordering; the pattern tells you more than the total.
Frequently asked questions
Why is my sent count lower than the number of messages sent?
Because "sent" is counted per recipient, not per message, and a recipient only counts as sent when every message in its sequence succeeded. In a three-message campaign, a recipient whose third message failed is recorded as failed even though two messages arrived.
Does a completed campaign mean everyone received the message?
No. Completed means every recipient was attempted. Some attempts may have failed — check the per-recipient results or export the log from Analytics.
What is the difference between a failed and a skipped recipient?
Failed means the send was attempted and did not succeed, with a reason recorded. Skipped means it was deliberately not attempted, most often because a daily sending limit was reached.
Can I safely re-send to failed recipients?
Be careful. A recipient that failed part-way through a multi-message sequence has already received the earlier messages, so re-sending the whole sequence duplicates them. Check the log before re-running.
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