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Webchat

Deploy an AI agent to websites.

Webchat is Proto's embeddable chat popup for websites — free on every plan.

Visitors interact with the AI agent — and later a live agent — directly from your site. In the agent's Publish tab, create a Webchat channel or select an existing one from the table to open its settings.


Basic settings

In the Basics accordion:

Setting
Description

Name

Internal name distinguishing this channel from other Webchat instances.

Default chat language

Language used at the start of a new chat. Available languages are set in the agent's Agent settings.

Icon

The channel's avatar, seen by live agents in the Inbox.

Enable attachments

Lets people upload files and images to the chat.

Enable audio messaging

Lets people submit voice messages in addition to text.

Enable voice conversations

Lets people have a real-time spoken exchange with the AI agent, whose replies are read aloud instead of just shown as text — see How voice conversations work below. Only available when the AI agent has both Speech-to-text and Text-to-speech enabled — see the Voice tab of Manage AI agents. If either is off, the checkbox is shown but disabled. Turning it on doesn't require Enable audio messaging to also be on — the two are independent.

Enable emojis

Shows an emoji picker in the message input.

Hide webchat if no live agents online

Hides the popup entirely when no agent is online.

Enable audio messaging and Enable voice conversations sit together under a Voice and audio heading within the accordion.

While a voice conversation is active, the AI agent's spoken replies always include their text transcript alongside the audio, regardless of the agent's Include audio transcript setting (Voice tab of Manage AI agents). That setting only affects transcripts on ordinary voice messages sent outside conversation mode.

Select Save to confirm edits.

How voice conversations work

Once enabled, an open conversation shows a Chat / Voice tab switcher below the message box. This is only available in the standard Webchat popup — not in the Showcase or full-screen Webchat experience, where the setting isn't supported yet.

Selecting Voice:

  • Immediately requests the browser's microphone permission and starts listening — there's no separate record step.

  • Shows a live waveform and a status label (Listening, Thinking, Speaking) as the exchange proceeds. A person's turn ends automatically after a short pause in speaking — no button press needed — and the AI's reply is then played aloud, with listening resuming automatically afterwards, so the exchange continues hands-free until the person selects the close button or leaves the conversation.

  • Offers a language picker for the language being spoken, drawn from the AI agent's Speech-to-text languages (Voice tab of Manage AI agents). It's disabled while microphone access is being requested.

The Voice tab is greyed out, with an explanatory tooltip, when:

  • The person has denied microphone access in their browser. It stays unavailable for the rest of that browsing session unless they re-grant permission.

  • The conversation is currently being handled by a live agent rather than the AI agent — voice conversations only work with the AI agent. If a conversation already in voice mode is transferred or taken over by a live agent, the widget automatically switches back to the regular Chat tab.

Messages sent in a voice conversation, and the AI agent's spoken replies, appear in the conversation log as plain transcript text — unlike a one-off voice message sent via Enable audio messaging, which appears as a playable audio clip.


Brand

In the Brand accordion, customise and preview the popup's appearance.

An optional page before the chat interface.

Setting
Description

Enable welcome screen

Toggles whether to include the welcome screen.

Title

The welcome screen heading.

Description

The welcome screen subtitle.

Start chat button

Text of the button used to launch a new chat.

Setting
Description

AI agent display name

The name of the AI in the header.

Description

Subtext under the name in the header, e.g. "Replies immediately" — set for both AI and live agents.

Message placeholder

Placeholder text in the input field.

Setting
Description

Border radius

Roundness of the popup corners.

Header colour

Background colour of the headers.

Message colour

Background colour of the person's message bubbles.

Buttons colour

Used for buttons and quick reply options.

AI agent icon

Avatar used in the toggle button, header, and next to AI messages.

Popup toggle button

Circle or rounded square.

Popup position

Bottom right or bottom left of the screen.

Select Save to confirm all edits.


Pre-chat form

In the Pre-Chat Form accordion, define a form that opens before new chats.

Setting
Description

Enable pre-chat form

Toggles whether the form is applied before new chats.

Message

The title of the form.

Button text

The submit button's content.

Form fields

Add, reorder, set placeholders, mark as Required, and delete. Field types: Name, Email, Phone number, or any custom field for people.

Select Save to confirm edits.


Mobile behaviour

In the Mobile Behaviour accordion:

Setting
Description

Mobile screen width threshold

The mobile breakpoint.

Fullscreen on mobile

Popup opens fullscreen on small screens.

Hide on mobile

Removes the toggle button and popup entirely.

Mobile size

Width and Height as a percentage of the viewport, when Fullscreen is off.


Test and deploy

In the Setup accordion, follow the Test link to try the AI agent in a webchat sandbox page.

To deploy, copy the Deploy script and paste it into the <body> tag of the webpages it should appear on.


Proactive messagesHuman handoff

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