WhatsApp is permitting AI providers to keep offering their chatbots to users who have Brazilian phone numbers. This comes just days after Brazil’s competition regulator instructed the company to halt its new policy, which prohibits third-party, general-purpose chatbots from operating on the app through its business API.

According to the updated policy, the company had originally set a 90-day grace period starting January 15 for developers and AI providers. They were required to stop responding to user queries on the chat app and to notify users that their chatbots would no longer function on WhatsApp. However, a recent notice states, “The requirement to cease responding to user queries and implement pre-approved auto-reply language (mentioned below) before January 15, 2026, no longer applies when messaging people with a Brazil country code (+55).” WhatsApp has not yet responded to a request to confirm this decision.

The policy, which takes effect immediately, affects general-purpose chatbots such as ChatGPT and Grok on the platform. It is important to note that the policy does not prevent businesses from using bots to provide customer service to their own customers within WhatsApp.

In its notice, Brazil’s competition agency indicated it will examine whether Meta’s terms unfairly exclude competitors and give undue advantage to Meta AI, the company’s own chatbot available on WhatsApp. Meta previously granted a similar exemption to users in Italy after that country’s competition agency raised concerns about the policy in December.

Additionally, the European Union has initiated an antitrust investigation into these new rules. The company has repeatedly stated that AI chatbots are overloading its systems, which were originally designed for different uses of its business API. Meta has even suggested in the past that users who wish to use alternative chatbots can do so outside of WhatsApp.

“These claims are fundamentally flawed,” a WhatsApp spokesperson said on Tuesday in response to the investigation by Brazil’s competition authority. “The emergence of AI chatbots on our Business API put a strain on our systems that they were not designed to support. This logic assumes WhatsApp is somehow a de facto app store. The route to market for AI companies is the app stores themselves, their websites and industry partnerships; not the WhatsApp Business Platform.”