> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.useboom.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.
# Drafts
> Hold a journey's sends for a person to review, then approve or reject each one before it reaches the customer.
A **draft** is a journey send that waits for approval. Boom prepares the message
exactly as it would send it, with the recipient, the sender and every variable
filled in, and holds it. Nothing reaches the customer until someone on your team
approves it.
Use drafts when a person should see a message before it goes out:
* **The first sends to a new audience.** Check a few real messages before you let
the rest go.
* **Sensitive content.** Collections, account changes, or anything where a wrong
variable would hurt.
* **Compliance review.** When your process needs a named person to sign off on
each outbound message.
Drafting is set per send step, so one journey can draft its first message and
send the follow-ups on its own.
## Turn it on
In the journey builder, select a **Send message** step (WhatsApp, template
mode) or a **Send email** step.
Under **Delivery**, switch from **Send immediately** to **Draft for
approval**. The step gains a third exit, **Rejected**, next to **Sent** and
**Capped, not sent**.
Connect **Rejected** to whatever should happen when a reviewer says no: a
different message, a wait and another try, or an exit. Leave it unconnected
and the person's run ends quietly.
Publish the journey as usual. From then on, every send from that step waits
for review.
## Review drafts
Drafts are reviewed inside the campaign or initiative they belong to. Open it and
choose **Drafts** in its sidebar, under **Operational**, after **Executions**. The
sidebar shows how many drafts are pending (up to "99+"). The initiative page shows
an **N drafts waiting** button, and the journey builder toolbar shows the same count
as a badge. Both open the Drafts tab.
### By template
The tab opens **By template**: pending drafts grouped by what you are actually
approving, one row per template version at each step. A row shows the template
(and, if the template has changed since, which version these drafts were made
from), the step, how many are pending, and how many have waited more than 24
hours. Click a group, or move with **J** and **K**, to see one example message
from it, rendered exactly as it would be sent, plus a warning if the template was
edited after the drafts were created.
**Approve N…** and **Reject N…** decide the whole group. The confirmation, just
above the example, gives the count, how many have waited more than 24 hours, and
that drafts arriving later are not included. The same 5 second undo applies. The
group then shows how many were sent and, if any could not be, how many, with a
link that opens them in **One by one**.
**Approve all…** in this view lists each group and its count before you confirm.
### Odd values
Some messages would go out wrong: a name that came through empty, or an amount
of zero. For a WhatsApp group, **Variables in this group** lists each template
variable with how many distinct values it takes and how many drafts have it
empty or at zero (a value such as `$0.00` or `0,00 MXN`). The **To review** column in
the group list shows how many drafts in each group have at least one.
These drafts are left out of **Approve N…** and **Approve all…** by default. The confirmation says
how many stay behind for review, and **Include the N with odd values** adds them
back. Click a count, or **Review them one by one**, to open just those drafts in
**One by one** (the **To review** chip; remove it to see the rest). In the
preview, an odd value is shaded amber with a solid underline, an empty one reads
**Empty** in the variables list, and a notice names each odd variable.
Odd values are checked for WhatsApp only. Email drafts do not store their
variables yet, so for email, check the example.
### One by one
Switch to **One by one** to review drafts individually. It can be narrowed to a
single group (the **Template: …** chip; remove it to see every draft again).
The list shows every draft with its recipient, step, status and age, plus the first
line of its message (the WhatsApp text or the email subject). A pending draft older
than 24 hours is marked in amber, because its content was fixed when it was drafted.
Use **Filter**
to narrow it by status, channel, journey version, step or when it was created, and
**Refresh** to pick up new ones.
Click a row to see the preview: the exact message that will be sent, with the
template, the variables, and for email the From, Reply-To and subject. In a
WhatsApp preview, the values filled into the template are lightly shaded with a
dotted underline, so you can check each one. On a narrower screen the preview
opens as a drawer from the bottom, only when you tap a row. The preview also
shows how old the draft is, and warns **Template edited since drafted** if the
template changed after the draft was made. For email, **Show full email** opens
the whole message. A draft that has been decided shows who approved or rejected it,
and when.
You can decide:
* **One draft**, with **Approve** or **Reject** in its preview. There is no
confirmation step, and the preview moves to the next pending draft right away.
* **A selection**, by ticking rows and choosing **Approve selected** or **Reject
selected**. Approving, or rejecting more than one, asks you to confirm the count
first, just above the list.
* **Everything matching the current filter**, with **Approve all…**, or **Reject
all pending…** in the **⋯** menu. Drafts created after you opened the page are
not included, so you never approve something you have not had the chance to see.
The confirmation shows how many messages will go out and how many have waited
more than 24 hours. Approving leaves out WhatsApp drafts with
[odd values](#odd-values) unless you tick them in. Rejecting everything confirms in red and says that nothing
will be sent.
### Five seconds to undo
Every decision waits 5 seconds before Boom acts on it. The preview, and a notice
at the bottom of the screen, count down (**Sending to Ana in 5s**) with an
**Undo** button. Undo inside those 5 seconds and nothing happens: the draft stays
pending and nothing was sent. You can keep reviewing other drafts while one counts
down. If you leave the page during the countdown, the decision is dropped and the
draft stays pending.
After the countdown, an approved draft shows **Sending…**, then **Sent**, or
**Could not send** with what happened and what to do, for example that Meta no
longer approves the template. A draft that could not be sent stays in the list
with that reason. If someone else decided the draft first, the preview says who
and when instead.
Once you click into the list or a preview, the keyboard works too: the arrow keys
move through the list, **Space** ticks a row and **Enter** opens it. **J** and
**K** move between drafts, **A** approves, **R** rejects, and **Esc** closes the
preview. Holding a key down does nothing extra, and **A** is ignored for a moment
after the preview moves on, so a double press cannot approve two people. Screen
readers hear the open draft's name and its position in the list.
When you reject, you can add an optional reason. It is kept on the draft as the
reviewer's note.
## What happens next
**Approve** sends the message you previewed, exactly as it is. Boom does not
render it again, so a template edit made after the draft was created does not
change what goes out. The journey's send window and your channel's rate limits
still apply, so a large approval goes out at the same pace as live traffic. The
run then continues on **Sent**.
**Reject** sends nothing. The run takes the **Rejected** exit, or ends if nothing
is connected to it. A rejected draft costs no credits: credits are only used when a
message is actually sent.
### Checked again at delivery
Some things can change while a draft waits. These are checked again when an
approved draft is delivered, and the draft is not sent if any fails. The
**Rejected** exit is only for a reviewer's rejection, so it never catches these.
Each one takes the path below:
* **Do Not Contact.** A person who opted out in the meantime is skipped. On
WhatsApp the run ends. On email the run continues on **Sent**, the same as an
email step that skips an opted-out person without drafts.
* **The template.** A WhatsApp template no longer approved by Meta, or an email
template no longer published, stops the send and the run ends.
* **The sender.** A WhatsApp number or email sender that is no longer available
stops the send and the run ends.
* **The journey.** If the journey was stopped, the draft is not sent and the run
ends.
* **Smart Sending.** The [message limit](/smart-sending) is checked at delivery, not
when the draft is created. An approved draft that would go over the limit is not
sent: the run takes **Capped, not sent**, or ends if that path is not connected.
Re-enroll the person later if the message is still needed.
* **A reply (WhatsApp only).** If the person replies while an approved WhatsApp
draft is waiting for its send window, the draft is skipped and the run
continues on **Sent**. Email drafts have no send window, so this never applies
to them.
Each draft keeps its final status (Sent, Skipped, Failed, Canceled) and the
reason, so the tab shows what happened to it.
## Limits
* **Supported steps.** WhatsApp template messages and email. Free-text WhatsApp,
SMS, Instagram and Messenger sends cannot be drafted.
* **Not in Transactional messages.** A [transactional
message](/transactional-messages) has to go out when its event fires, so its
journey cannot use drafts.
* **Several runs at once.** On a journey with [several runs per
person](/journeys#several-runs-at-once), a send that waits for a send window
cannot be drafted.
* **Drafts do not expire yet.** A draft waits until someone decides it, however
long that takes.
* **A waiting draft keeps the person in the journey.** While their draft is
pending, the same person cannot be enrolled again in that journey. Approve or
reject it first.
* **Stopping the journey cancels its drafts.** Pending drafts move to Canceled
and those runs end.
* **Drafts can be turned off for an organization.** When they are, the
**Delivery** option is gone from the builder, and a journey with a step set to
**Draft for approval** cannot be published. Drafts already waiting stay on the
Drafts tab and can still be approved or rejected. A waiting draft is never sent
without approval. Contact Boom support to turn drafts off or back on.
## Permissions
Two permissions control drafts, in the app and over MCP alike.
| Permission | Lets someone | Roles that have it |
| - | - | - |
| `org:drafts:read` | See the Drafts tab, its count and the previews. | Owner, Admin, Member, Viewer |
| `org:drafts:update` | Approve and reject drafts. | Owner, Admin |
Someone with read but not update sees the list and previews, without checkboxes
or approve and reject buttons. Over MCP, `drafts_list`, `drafts_get` and
`drafts_count` need read and `drafts_decide` needs update, so a Member can review what is waiting
but only an Owner or Admin can send it. See
[roles and permissions](/use-mcp#roles-and-permissions).
## Over MCP
An AI agent connected over [MCP](/use-mcp) can review drafts too:
* `drafts_list` lists drafts, with a preview of each, filtered by initiative,
status and more. It returns `asOf`, the server time of the read.
* `drafts_get` returns one draft by id: its full preview, and who decided it,
when and why.
* `drafts_count` counts the pending drafts a filter matches. Pass the `asOf`
from `drafts_list` as `createdTo` to get the exact number a filter decide
would change.
* `drafts_decide` approves or rejects drafts by id, or everything matching a
filter. Approving sends **real messages**. A filter decide needs the `asOf`
from `drafts_list` and an `expectedCount` from `drafts_count`. If the number
of matching drafts has changed, it is refused and nothing is decided.
To decide one template version at one step, the same group the Drafts tab
shows, filter by `workflowId`, `nodeId`, `templateId` and `templateUpdatedAt`,
taking the last two from a `drafts_list` row.
* Every filter takes `odd`: `"only"` for WhatsApp drafts with an empty or zero
variable value, `"exclude"` for all the others (to approve a group without
them, as the Drafts tab does).
When authoring a journey over MCP or the API, set `delivery: "draft"` on a
`SEND_MESSAGE` (template mode) or `SEND_EMAIL` node. See [journeys](/journeys).
There is no REST endpoint for deciding drafts. Approving a send has to name the
person who approved it, and an organization API key identifies the integration,
not a person. See [one uniform surface](/one-surface).
If you use [webhooks](/webhooks), a run that ended because its draft was
rejected reports `journey_run.ended` with `reason: completed`. To tell it apart,
read the participant's step history: the send step's `emittedSignal` is
`REJECTED`.
## Related
Build the workflow whose send steps you draft.
The message limit an approved draft is checked against.
Review and decide drafts from an AI tool.
How a rejected draft shows up on `journey_run.ended`.
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