Human handoff: step into any live conversation

Shipped

September 22, 2026

Area

Conversations

Available on

Pro and Max

Your chatbot handles most questions on its own. But some conversations need a person: an upset customer, a complicated quote, a deal that's about to close. Until now, you could read those conversations in Studio but not join them. Now your team can step in, reply as themselves, and hand the chat back to the AI when they're done.

What's new

• Visitors can ask for a person. In website chat, visitors can tap Talk to a human in the chat menu. The AI keeps helping until someone from your team takes over.
• Your team is alerted in Studio. A request shows up as Human support requested, with a link to open the conversation.
• Take over any live conversation. Any teammate can open a conversation and switch on takeover. The AI pauses and you reply directly, in the same conversation, while it's still happening.
• Works on social channels too. You can take over conversations on WhatsApp, Instagram DM and Facebook Messenger. Your replies are delivered on that channel, and you can pause the AI for that contact.
• Hand it back. Switch takeover off and the AI picks up the conversation again.
• Delivery you can trust. If a reply to a social channel can't be confirmed as delivered, Studio tells you and lets you retry it without sending a duplicate.

How to use it

1. Open your chatbot in Studio and click Advanced Settings.
2. Go to the Human handoff tab and switch it on. Publish your chatbot so visitors see the option.
3. When a visitor asks for help, open the conversation from the alert, or from the conversation list.
4. Switch on takeover. The status changes to AI paused and you can type in Reply to the visitor…
5. For WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger conversations, open the conversation under Socials and use Take Control.
6. When you're done, switch takeover off to hand the conversation back to the AI.

Good to know

• Available on Pro and Max. On other plans the setting is shown but switched off, with the plan it needs.
• The AI doesn't stop on its own. A request for a person alerts your team, but the AI keeps answering until someone takes over. It works best when someone on your team is around to respond.
• Visitors only ever see their own conversation. Takeover doesn't expose one visitor's chat to another.
• There's more since launch. Visitors now see when a person joins, and handing back got its own button. See visitors see when a person joins and hand back to AI.
• For setup details, see the human handoff help guide.