In two lines: Messages mode is a short version of MB Suite for teams that only answer messages: WhatsApp numbers and the direct messages of Instagram, Facebook and TikTok. Your team sees five entries —Messages, People, AI Team, Connections and Settings— on the same data as the full MB Suite: nothing is deleted, and you switch back whenever you want.

Who is it for?

For a business whose day-to-day is answering WhatsApp and social messages: connecting the team's numbers, one shared inbox and an AI that answers first. Instead of setting up the CRM screen by screen, each task has a single screen. And because it's the same MB Suite, the day you want pipelines, campaigns, email or reports, you switch to the full version and find every person, chat and setting where you left it, with nothing to migrate.

How do I switch to Messages mode?

Go to Settings > Modules. At the top, MB Suite mode shows the two options side by side, each with its description: The full MB Suite, marked Current, and Messages mode.
In the Messages mode option, press Switch to this mode. Before anything changes, a window shows you what your team will see, which modules are deactivated and which stay active, and what keeps running after the switch. Your subscription doesn't change.
Confirm with Switch to Messages mode. MB Suite opens in Messages, and from then on everyone in the workspace sees the short menu.

Some things keep running after the switch, even if their module is deactivated or isn't in the mode's menu: scheduled posts, report deliveries, alerts, email flows and campaigns, rank tracking, site audits, Google Ads automatic budgets and Link Checker, the Inbox AI positions that reply on their own on social media, and the webhooks that send data to other tools. The window lists what you have, each with View to open it: if you don't want something to keep going, pause it on its screen before you switch.

The modules the mode doesn't use are deactivated with everything they hold, and they come back as they were when you switch back. What serves people outside your team, or what you pay for separately, is never deactivated: for example, Phones, the Inbox, the Client Portal, Web Forms, API & MCP, or Email Marketing if it has a paid plan. Those keep working the same way, but they aren't in the mode's menu: to see or pause them, go back to the full MB Suite.

Only an owner or an admin changes the mode. A workspace with Accounts can't switch to it: the short menu has no Accounts, so the mode is chosen in each Account with its own subscription. That's why, in that workspace, the Messages mode option shows “This workspace has Accounts: Messages mode is chosen in each Account.” instead of the button. In an Account managed by its workspace, without a plan of its own, the block doesn't appear.

What does your team see?

Messages — the inbox of WhatsApp and of the Instagram, Facebook and TikTok direct messages; it's the same as CRM > Messages, with the number of unread chats next to it.
People — the people who write to you or that you added, each with their history: the CRM's People.
AI Team — the AI positions that answer first, the same as the CRM's AI Team.
Connections — your WhatsApp numbers and your Instagram, Facebook and TikTok accounts, with who handles each one.
Settings — five tabs: Team, Custom fields (of people and companies), AI credits, Subscription and Mode, where you go back to the full MB Suite.

Everyone sees Messages and People; AI Team, Connections and Settings are only for the workspace's owners and admins. The Command Palette (⌘K) offers only these entries too.

How do I connect my WhatsApp numbers?

Connections brings WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook and TikTok together on one screen: each one is a row you open, with its status and what's missing. You don't have to go through Integrations or Data Sources first: everything starts here.

Open the WhatsApp row and press Connect a number (or Add another number if you already have one). The Add WhatsApp number window asks how you use the number: in the WhatsApp Business app on a phone (coexistence), one that already sends through the WhatsApp API in your Business Manager, or a brand-new one. They're the same ways as in the full MB Suite, explained in Connect or buy your WhatsApp line.
Follow Meta's window; with a number that already sends through the API, you then tick it in the list and confirm Activate as an API line. Connections activates the number for you —you don't have to add it anywhere else— and asks two things: Who handles this number? and Who handles a new contact first? Answer and press Done, or choose Later: the number shows what's missing until you decide.
From then on, each number shows Handled by and New contact, and you change them from the number itself. Its menu ⋮ has View in Messages and Remove number and, when the number needs it, Reconnect this number (if it lost its connection) or Retry history sync (if bringing in the phone's history failed), as in Phones & WhatsApp. If what stopped working is the Facebook permission your numbers send with, the menu offers Reconnect WhatsApp instead: it opens Settings > Integrations, outside the mode's menu, and it's fixed there once for every number.

Handled by lists the people who work that number: they get the alerts of its new messages and, for the AI, they're “the number’s sales rep”. You choose them from the CRM team; an owner or an admin who isn't on it yet joins as CRM Admin, and Invite someone… opens the invitation with that number already chosen. New contact decides who owns each person who comes into the CRM for the first time through that number —they become a prospect—, with the same terms as the assignment of the full CRM:

The number’s sales rep — whoever handles that number. It's only for WhatsApp.
A fixed person — every new contact goes to the same person.
Distribute across a team · Round robin — one contact each, in order, among the people you choose.
The AI — a position of your AI Team answers first and then hands the conversation over to a person: the one in charge of the position or, if the position uses The number’s sales rep, whoever handles that number. More in The CRM's AI Team.
No automatic assignment — new contacts come in without an owner until someone takes them.

Whether each sales rep sees only the chats of their numbers depends on Sales reps only see their own, in Settings > Team: the mode doesn't activate it by itself. With two or more sales reps and that switch off, the Team tab reminds you that every sales rep sees everyone's conversations. And if a number's assignment was set in the full MB Suite with options this screen doesn't have, Connections shows it as custom and it's changed there.

And Instagram, Facebook and TikTok?

Open the network's row and press Connect Instagram (or Connect Facebook, or Connect TikTok). Before you confirm, the window tells you what happens: the Inbox is activated for all your connected accounts and brings in their latest conversations, and every new message on that account comes into Messages, even from people who had already written to you. The conversations where the person doesn't write again (a reply from your team doesn't move them) stay in the Inbox of the full MB Suite.
A list shows the progress of each step: connecting with Meta or TikTok, choosing the account, activating the Inbox, bringing in that network's messages, creating that network's lead source, who handles first and starting to receive. If a step is left halfway, Complete picks it up from there.
From then on, every new message on that account comes into Messages, and each person who comes into the CRM for the first time becomes a prospect. If the person had already written to you before, their conversation comes in with its earlier messages (up to the 200 most recent). New contact works as on WhatsApp, except The number’s sales rep, which is only for WhatsApp. Remove account stops bringing in its messages; the ones that already came in are kept.

Instagram needs one more step, in the Instagram app: allowing access to messages. Connections shows you the path in a blue notice, which ends in Allow access to messages; without it, Instagram doesn't pass the messages on to MB Suite. TikTok requires a business account for direct messages. And comments don't reach Messages.

How do I add my team?

In Settings > Team, press Add to the team and type their email.
Choose the Role: Sales rep, who handles their numbers and only sees the CRM, or Manager, who sees the whole team's conversations.
In Numbers they handle, choose their WhatsApp numbers. For a number that still doesn't say who handles a new contact, the window already proposes that whoever writes to it for the first time is assigned to this person.
Press Send invitation. They get an email to join; when they accept, they're on the CRM team with their role and their numbers. Until then the invitation shows Waiting for acceptance, and you can Resend it or Cancel invitation.

If the email already belongs to someone in your workspace, the window tells you and you add them directly, without an invitation. To change someone's role or numbers, use Edit in the Numbers column. If an invitation was accepted but couldn't be fully set up, the list tells you, and Retry finishes what was missing. And a Sales rep invited this way keeps seeing only the CRM even if you switch to the full MB Suite: their permissions don't change.

To take someone off the team, open them in the list and use Remove from CRM: they stop handling their numbers, and their conversations, people and prospects stay in their name until you hand them over to someone else. The Also remove their access to the workspace box comes checked.

Day to day in Messages

Messages works exactly as in the full MB Suite: you reply within the 24-hour window or with a template, and each chat has its owner. To give a chat to someone else, click the Owner chip at the top of the chat, or use Hand over to another seller in its menu: it changes, in one go, the owner of the person, their prospect and their open deal. Step by step in Reply to WhatsApp in the Messages inbox.

How do I go back to the full MB Suite?

In Settings, open the last tab, Mode. It has the same MB Suite mode block, with Messages mode marked Current. Under The full MB Suite, press Switch to this mode.
The window shows which modules are activated again —the ones you had before Messages mode, as they were— and, if some sales reps only see the CRM, reminds you that their permissions don't change. Your subscription doesn't change either.
Confirm with Switch to the full MB Suite. Everyone sees the full menu again, and MB Suite opens in the Overview.

What you set up in the mode stays in its usual place in the full MB Suite: your numbers in CRM > Settings > Acquisition > Phones & WhatsApp (who handles each one, as the line's receivers and sales reps), each New contact as a lead source with its assignment rule, named after the number or the account, and your team in CRM > Settings > Team.

Connecting your numbers and accounts, the messages MB Suite brings in from them and your team's access to them are governed by the Terms and Conditions, which always hold the current version.

Still have questions?

Ask MIA, the MB Suite AI assistant: open it with the MB AI button (⌘J) in the top bar. MIA knows the section you're in, so you can ask it about what you see on screen — and it can also answer how-to questions about using MB Suite.

Messages mode: MB Suite for teams that only handle WhatsApp and social messages