Is it possible to create surveys using OpenWA?

[rorar]

Background: I collect free food from supermarkets and share them with peoples. I ask them if they come to collect and use the survey functionality for that:

Will you come?
[ ] 👍
[ ] 👎

[rmyndharis]

Hi @rorar — yes, OpenWA supports this natively. What you're describing maps to a WhatsApp poll, exposed via the POST /api/sessions/:sessionId/messages/send-poll endpoint.

For your use case:

{
  "chatId": "<recipient-group-or-contact-id>",
  "name": "Will you come?",
  "options": ["Yes 👍", "No 👎"],
  "allowMultipleAnswers": false
}

curl -X POST "$BASE/api/sessions/my-session/messages/send-poll" \
  -H "X-API-Key: $API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{ "chatId": "<id>", "name": "Will you come?", "options": ["Yes 👍", "No 👎"] }'

Recipients tap an option to vote and the result tallies automatically inside WhatsApp — no need for the markdown [ ] checkbox style, which isn't a native WhatsApp construct. This is supported on both the whatsapp-web.js and baileys engines.

A few notes:

• Options: 2–12 items, each up to 100 characters. allowMultipleAnswers: false keeps it single-choice (what you want here).
• Multiple recipients: each poll is scoped to a single chatId. To broadcast to a contact list, send one poll per recipient (or use the bulk-send batch endpoint and poll batchStatus).
• Tracking responses: incoming votes arrive as normal messages and can be consumed via the webhook system if you need to aggregate counts outside WhatsApp.

Full reference: docs/06-api-specification.md → POST /messages/send-poll. Hope this helps!

[rorar]

Thank you :)