AI Reply Format: Plain Text or Markdown
2 min read
Reply format controls how your AI bot writes its answers. By default the bot replies in plain text, so customers never see stray symbols like asterisks or pound signs in their messages. If you want bullets, bold text, numbered lists or tables, you can turn markdown on for a specific bot.
The setting applies to every text channel: web chat, SMS, WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter, email, Apple Messages and the other text channels. Voice calls always stay plain, spoken-style text, whatever you pick.
Where to set it
- In Admin, open Bots and pick the bot.
- Go to AI Settings, then General.
- Choose an option under Reply format and save.
You can also set it with the Velaro CLI: velaro ai-config set-reply-format <id> --mode global|plain|markdown.
The options
| Option | What the bot does |
|---|---|
| Use global (default) | Follows the platform default, which is plain text. No bold, headings, backticks or tables, and no em or en dashes. The bot uses commas, periods or a plain hyphen instead. |
| Force plain text | Same output as the global default, but pinned for this bot even if the global default changes later. |
| Allow markdown | The bot may use bullets, bold, numbered lists and tables when they help the answer. |
Bullets and tables in your prompt
If your bot's prompt tells it to answer in bullets or a table, or a customer asks for one, the bot follows that only when Allow markdown is on. With plain text, the bot writes the same information as simple sentences or short lines instead.
Which option should I pick?
- Leave it on Use global for SMS, WhatsApp and Apple Messages bots. Markdown symbols can show up as literal characters in SMS and iMessage.
- Choose Allow markdown for a web chat bot only if your chat window renders formatting, and you want structured answers such as comparison tables or step lists.
- Choose Force plain text if you want a bot to stay plain no matter what the global default becomes.
A plain hyphen is always allowed in every mode.
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