diff --git a/backend/api/whatsapp-webhook.php b/backend/api/whatsapp-webhook.php
index 6ba6648..cbc0ca5 100644
--- a/backend/api/whatsapp-webhook.php
+++ b/backend/api/whatsapp-webhook.php
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 <?php
 /**
- * WhatsApp Gateway Webhook Receiver & QR Code Viewer (6 Slots)
+ * WhatsApp Gateway Webhook Receiver & QR Code Viewer (3 Slots)
  */
 
 require_once __DIR__ . '/../includes/Redis.php';
@@ -45,7 +45,7 @@ if ($_SERVER['REQUEST_METHOD'] === 'POST') {
 
 // Prepare slots data for UI
 $slots = [];
-for ($i = 1; $i <= 6; $i++) {
+for ($i = 1; $i <= 3; $i++) {
     $sk = "slot-{$i}";
     $slots[$sk] = [
         'status' => $redis->get("whatsapp:{$sk}:status") ?: 'disconnected',
@@ -59,7 +59,7 @@ for ($i = 1; $i <= 6; $i++) {
 <head>
     <meta charset="UTF-8">
     <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">
-    <title>إدارة أرقام بوابة الواتساب (6 جلسات) — Flash Call OTP</title>
+    <title>إدارة أرقام بوابة الواتساب (3 جلسات) — Flash Call OTP</title>
     <link href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css2?family=Cairo:wght@400;600;700&display=swap" rel="stylesheet">
     <script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/qrcodejs/1.0.0/qrcode.min.js"></script>
     <style>
@@ -140,7 +140,7 @@ for ($i = 1; $i <= 6; $i++) {
 </head>
 <body>
     <div class="header">
-        <h1>إدارة أرقام بوابة الواتساب (6 جلسات)</h1>
+        <h1>إدارة أرقام بوابة الواتساب (3 جلسات)</h1>
         <p>يتم توزيع رسائل الـ OTP تلقائياً على الأرقام المتصلة بالتناوب (Round-Robin).</p>
         <button class="refresh-btn global-refresh" onclick="window.location.reload();">تحديث جميع الحالات 🔄</button>
     </div>
diff --git a/whatsapp-gateway/puppeteer-client.js b/whatsapp-gateway/puppeteer-client.js
index d2b6b10..8185b15 100644
--- a/whatsapp-gateway/puppeteer-client.js
+++ b/whatsapp-gateway/puppeteer-client.js
@@ -1,9 +1,11 @@
 const fs = require('fs');
 const path = require('path');
 const axios = require('axios');
+const { execSync } = require('child_process');
 const { Client, LocalAuth, MessageMedia } = require('whatsapp-web.js');
 
 const sessions = new Map();
+const readyTimers = new Map();
 
 const SESSIONS_DIR = path.join(__dirname, 'sessions');
 if (!fs.existsSync(SESSIONS_DIR)) {
@@ -25,6 +27,7 @@ const puppeteerConfig = {
     '--disable-background-timer-throttling',
     '--disable-backgrounding-occluded-windows',
     '--disable-renderer-backgrounding',
+    '--disable-session-crashed-bubble',
     '--user-agent=Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/122.0.0.0 Safari/537.36'
   ]
 };
@@ -48,7 +51,9 @@ function cleanChromeLocks(sessionKey) {
   const sessionPath = path.join(SESSIONS_DIR, `session-${sessionKey}`);
   const lockFiles = [
     path.join(sessionPath, 'SingletonLock'),
-    path.join(sessionPath, 'Default', 'SingletonLock')
+    path.join(sessionPath, 'Default', 'SingletonLock'),
+    path.join(sessionPath, 'SingletonCookie'),
+    path.join(sessionPath, 'Default', 'SingletonCookie')
   ];
   for (const lockFile of lockFiles) {
     try {
@@ -62,16 +67,33 @@ function cleanChromeLocks(sessionKey) {
   }
 }
 
-// Clear Session Folder recursively to prevent corruption on logouts
+// Kill any Chrome processes still holding this session folder
+function killChromeProcessesForSession(sessionKey) {
+  try {
+    const sessionPath = path.join(SESSIONS_DIR, `session-${sessionKey}`);
+    execSync(
+      `lsof +D "${sessionPath}" 2>/dev/null | awk 'NR>1 {print $2}' | xargs -r kill -9 2>/dev/null; sleep 1`,
+      { stdio: 'ignore', timeout: 5000 }
+    );
+  } catch (_) {}
+}
+
+// Clear Session Folder with retry mechanism
 function clearSessionFolder(sessionKey) {
   const sessionPath = path.join(SESSIONS_DIR, `session-${sessionKey}`);
-  try {
-    if (fs.existsSync(sessionPath)) {
-      console.log(`[CLEANUP] Recursively removing session folder for ${sessionKey}: ${sessionPath}`);
-      fs.rmSync(sessionPath, { recursive: true, force: true });
+  for (let attempt = 0; attempt < 3; attempt++) {
+    try {
+      if (fs.existsSync(sessionPath)) {
+        console.log(`[CLEANUP] Removing session folder for ${sessionKey} (attempt ${attempt + 1})`);
+        fs.rmSync(sessionPath, { recursive: true, force: true });
+      }
+      return;
+    } catch (err) {
+      console.warn(`[CLEANUP] Attempt ${attempt + 1} failed for ${sessionKey}: ${err.message}`);
+      if (attempt < 2) {
+        killChromeProcessesForSession(sessionKey);
+      }
     }
-  } catch (err) {
-    console.error(`[CLEANUP ERROR] Failed to delete session folder for ${sessionKey}:`, err.message);
   }
 }
 
@@ -124,8 +146,21 @@ async function startSession(session_key, webhook_url) {
         console.log(`[Session] ${session_key} authenticated successfully.`);
     });
 
+    client.on('auth_failure', async (reason) => {
+        console.error(`[Session] ${session_key} auth failure:`, reason);
+        await sendWebhook(webhook_url, {
+            session_key,
+            state: 'auth_failure',
+            reason: String(reason)
+        });
+    });
+
     client.on('ready', async () => {
         console.log(`[Session] ${session_key} is ready and connected.`);
+        if (readyTimers.has(session_key)) {
+            clearTimeout(readyTimers.get(session_key));
+            readyTimers.delete(session_key);
+        }
         const phoneNumber = client.info.wid.user;
         await sendWebhook(webhook_url, {
             session_key,
@@ -142,11 +177,29 @@ async function startSession(session_key, webhook_url) {
             reason: reason
         });
         sessions.delete(session_key);
+        if (readyTimers.has(session_key)) {
+            clearTimeout(readyTimers.get(session_key));
+            readyTimers.delete(session_key);
+        }
+        killChromeProcessesForSession(session_key);
         try { client.destroy(); } catch (_) {}
-        // Wipe session folder to prevent corrupted state loading on next boot
         clearSessionFolder(session_key);
     });
 
+    // Ready timeout: if ready doesn't fire within 90s, destroy and restart
+    const readyTimeout = setTimeout(async () => {
+        if (sessions.get(session_key) === client && (!client.info || !client.info.wid)) {
+            console.warn(`[Session] ${session_key} timeout: ready not fired in 90s, restarting...`);
+            sessions.delete(session_key);
+            readyTimers.delete(session_key);
+            killChromeProcessesForSession(session_key);
+            try { client.destroy(); } catch (_) {}
+            clearSessionFolder(session_key);
+            await startSession(session_key, webhook_url);
+        }
+    }, 90000);
+    readyTimers.set(session_key, readyTimeout);
+
     // Handle Incoming Messages to Webhook
     client.on('message', async (msg) => {
         if (msg.fromMe) return;
@@ -206,9 +259,17 @@ async function startSession(session_key, webhook_url) {
 async function disconnectSession(session_key) {
     const client = sessions.get(session_key);
     if (client) {
+        if (readyTimers.has(session_key)) {
+            clearTimeout(readyTimers.get(session_key));
+            readyTimers.delete(session_key);
+        }
+        // Kill Chrome processes first to release file locks
+        killChromeProcessesForSession(session_key);
         try {
             await client.logout();
-        } catch (_) {}
+        } catch (err) {
+            console.warn(`[Session] Logout error for ${session_key}: ${err.message}`);
+        }
         try {
             client.destroy();
         } catch (_) {}
diff --git a/whatsapp-gateway/server.js b/whatsapp-gateway/server.js
index 21cf2da..acc694c 100644
--- a/whatsapp-gateway/server.js
+++ b/whatsapp-gateway/server.js
@@ -92,7 +92,7 @@ app.post('/api/contacts/check', async (req, res) => {
 
     if (session_key === 'auto') {
         const activeSlots = [];
-        for (let i = 1; i <= 6; i++) {
+        for (let i = 1; i <= 3; i++) {
             if (isSessionReady(`slot-${i}`)) {
                 activeSlots.push(`slot-${i}`);
             }
@@ -140,7 +140,7 @@ app.post('/api/messages/send', async (req, res) => {
     try {
         if (session_key === 'auto') {
             let activeSlots = [];
-            for (let i = 1; i <= 6; i++) {
+            for (let i = 1; i <= 3; i++) {
                 if (isSessionReady(`slot-${i}`)) {
                     activeSlots.push(`slot-${i}`);
                 }
@@ -185,13 +185,21 @@ app.post('/api/messages/send', async (req, res) => {
     }
 });
 
-// Auto-start default sessions (6 slots)
-setTimeout(() => {
-    console.log('🔄 Auto-starting 6 WhatsApp slots...');
-    for (let i = 1; i <= 6; i++) {
-        startSession(`slot-${i}`, 'https://otp.intaleqapp.com/api/whatsapp-webhook.php').catch(console.error);
+// Auto-start default sessions (3 slots, staggered every 20s)
+async function startSlotsSequentially() {
+    console.log('🔄 Auto-starting 3 WhatsApp slots sequentially...');
+    const WEBHOOK_URL = 'https://otp.intaleqapp.com/api/whatsapp-webhook.php';
+    for (let i = 1; i <= 3; i++) {
+        console.log(`[Sequential] Starting slot-${i}...`);
+        startSession(`slot-${i}`, WEBHOOK_URL).catch(err => {
+            console.error(`[Sequential] slot-${i} failed:`, err.message);
+        });
+        if (i < 3) {
+            await new Promise(resolve => setTimeout(resolve, 20000));
+        }
     }
-}, 2000);
+}
+setTimeout(startSlotsSequentially, 2000);
 
 app.listen(PORT, () => {
     console.log(`🚀 Flash Call OTP WhatsApp Gateway running on port ${PORT}`);
