wa.me/username doesn't work yet — I verified it two ways

A developer tested whether wa.me/username links work in WhatsApp and found they do not, despite the rollout of @username handles. The server-side route for usernames exists but always resolves as 'not found', and testing on a real phone confirmed the links do not open a chat. The developer recommends using wa.me/<countrycode><number> or @username with a username key instead, and created a free tool at whatsusernames.link to generate working links and QR codes.

wa.me/username doesn't work yet — I verified it two ways, here's what to use instead If you've tried to build a "share my WhatsApp" link using a @username instead of a phone number, you've probably assumed wa.me/username or wa.me/u/username works the same way wa.me/15551234567 does. It doesn't — at least not yet, as of writing this. I wanted a definitive answer instead of trusting blog posts or AI chatbot answers more on that below , so I tested it two independent ways. curl -I https://wa.me/u/some real reserved username Every username path I tried — including a certified-real, currently-reserved username — 302-redirects to: api.whatsapp.com/resolve/?deeplink=...&not found=1 Compare that to the phone-number path, which redirects to: api.whatsapp.com/send/?phone=...&type=phone number Different resolver, different outcome. The server-side route for usernames exists, but every lookup currently resolves as "not found" — even for real, live usernames. Server response alone doesn't rule out Universal Links / App Links intercepting the URL client-side before it ever hits a server — curl can't see that. So I also opened all three link variants wa.me/username , wa.me/u/username , and a redirect through my own domain on a real phone with WhatsApp installed. None of them opened a chat. WhatsApp has rolled out @username handles as a real, user-facing feature — but it hasn't published a public deep-link spec for opening a chat from one, the way it has for phone numbers for years. If you're building a tool, a profile page, a business card generator, anything that assumes wa.me/username "just works," it doesn't, for anyone. One more data point: I asked Meta AI directly about this, with the counter-evidence above in hand. It kept asserting the link already works and didn't engage with the evidence when pushed. That's a useful reminder that chatbot answers about a fast-moving platform feature can be reciting stale/roadmap content rather than reflecting the live system — verify claims like this yourself before shipping something that depends on them. Until WhatsApp ships the real format, there are two things that work with zero surprises: wa.me/<countrycode <number still opens a chat directly, no manual step, no ambiguity. @username plus the "Username Key" if the person set one, which disambiguates people who share a username as text or a QR code, with an explicit "find me by username" instruction. One extra manual step, but it doesn't expose a phone number.I built a small free tool that generates both — link + downloadable QR — and is explicit on-page about which one actually works right now instead of pretending the username link is live: whatsusernames.link https://whatsusernames.link . No signup, nothing stored server-side. If anyone finds a case where wa.me/username does resolve for them, I'd genuinely like to know — that would mean a staged rollout is underway.