# Product catalog & cart messages

> Show products in WhatsApp and capture carts customers send.

_Source: https://hexafloww.com/docs/whatsapp/whatsapp-commerce_

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WhatsApp Commerce shows your product catalog inside WhatsApp so customers can browse, build a cart, and send it to you as an order message. Settings are at `/admin/whatsapp/settings/commerce`.

> [!TIP]
> **Before you start**
> - A catalog created in **Meta Commerce Manager**, owned by (or shared with) the same Business as your WhatsApp number. HexaFloww does not create the catalog.
> - Your Shopify store connected with product sync on — see [Connectors](https://hexafloww.com/docs/connectors/form-and-crm-connectors.md). This is where the product data comes from.
> - The `catalog_management` permission on your Meta app.

## Connect a catalog

1. **Paste your Catalog ID.** Copy the Catalog ID from Meta Commerce Manager and paste it on the commerce settings page. HexaFloww links it to your WhatsApp Business Account.
2. **Turn on cart and catalog visibility.** Enable **cart** and **catalog visible** so customers can see products and check out in chat. You can also toggle these directly in Meta Business Suite — the settings page reads the live values from Meta.
3. **Push your products.** Click **Push Catalog to Meta**. Large catalogs are sent as a background job; you can watch its progress. After the first push, product changes in Shopify sync across automatically.

## When a customer sends a cart

WhatsApp handles browsing and cart-building natively once the catalog is connected and visible. When the customer submits their cart, it arrives as an **order message**. HexaFloww:

- saves the cart contents and computes a total;
- matches the items to your synced products for readable names;
- creates or updates a [lead](https://hexafloww.com/docs/social-inbox/social-leads.md) and emails your admins.

> [!NOTE]
> HexaFloww does **not** create a Shopify order from the cart. The actual purchase still happens in Shopify; the existing order-status messages take over once a real order is placed.

### Status

Commerce is built but not yet verified end to end on every account — confirm the `catalog_management` permission is active before relying on it, and test with a small catalog first.