When to use it
Reach for Button when the answer belongs to a short, known set: a help topic, a yes or no, a department. Set the route for each option row in the editor. Use Auto Suggestion instead when the list is long, and Card when each choice needs an image.The gambit and its editor
Every page in this section shows the same demo flow: Start, a Welcome message, the gambit this page covers, then End. The gambit sits third, selected, with its editor open on the right. The rest of the screen is dimmed. The gambit in the builder carries one handle per option row, plus a Free Input handle while Allow Free Text is on. Generated buttons share their row’s handle. Below the label row, the editor holds Messages, Options, and Configuration, followed by the POST Action and Conditions switches.Messages
The bubbles the agent sends before it waits for a selection. Each message has a rich-text field and a Delay (ms) value. The delay sets the pause before the bubble is sent. Add Message appends another bubble, and the image icon attaches an image. Type @ in a message to insert a captured variable.Options
Each row defines one choice unless auto-population is on. Add Option appends a row and shows how many you have used out of a maximum of 30.
With more than one language configured, each option carries its own translation, and a row missing one is marked Missing translation. See Languages.
In the builder, the gambit shows up to 10 branch rows. Extra options collapse into a +N more chip. Hover the chip to preview the hidden options and the gambit each one connects to. Select it to open the editor.
On WhatsApp, up to three options are sent as reply buttons when every option’s text fits in 20 characters. Otherwise the options are sent as a list behind Show options, and text longer than 24 characters shows in full on a second line under the row. A menu with more than 10 options, or with any option text longer than 72 characters, is sent as one numbered text message instead. The editor shows a warning as soon as the list passes 10 options.
Read the selected value and label
A Button gambit stores both the value and the label of the choice the end user selected. With a variable namedfruit and a choice whose button text is Banana and whose value is yellow fruit:
When the end user selects several choices, both are joined with a comma. When free text is allowed and the end user types an answer that matches no choice, the value and the label are both that text. Type @ in a message to pick either one.
Auto populate options
An auto-populated option becomes one button for each item in a list variable. Use it when the choices come from an earlier step, such as the time slots an API call returns. When you select the list icon on a row, a field with the placeholder List variable, type @ to pick appears under it. Pick the variable that holds the list. In Button text and Value, type @ and pick{{item}} for the current list item. For a list of objects, select the pill to add a field, such as {{item.label}}.
If Value is empty, each button uses its button text as the value.
Each generated button keeps the row’s Jump to route, so every button from one row leads to the same gambit. Tars skips an item whose button text is empty. Within each auto-populated option row, Tars keeps only the first item for each value. The total number of buttons on the gambit stays at 30 or fewer.
The builder shows a warning on the gambit in two cases:
- The row has no list variable selected.
- The button text does not use
{{item}}, so every generated button shows the same label.
Configuration
Typed answers leave through the Free Input handle, so you can route a typed reply somewhere other than the option branches.