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openclaw channels

Manage chat channel accounts and their runtime status on the Gateway. Related docs:

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Common commands

channels status keeps configured channels visible when their plugin fails to load or register. Affected accounts report running: false, lifecycle: "blocked", and the plugin error instead of stale probe success. Run openclaw doctor, repair or update the plugin, and restart the Gateway before checking again. channels list shows chat channels only: configured accounts by default, with installed, configured, and enabled status tags per account (--json for machine output). Pass --all to also surface bundled channels that have no configured account yet and installable catalog channels that are not yet on disk. Provider auth and model usage live elsewhere: openclaw models auth list for provider auth profiles, openclaw status or openclaw models list for usage/quota. --json returns a local account inventory from plugin metadata without contacting the Gateway or executing channel setup/runtime code. Configured accounts remain visible even when their plugin has a setup entry. Use channels status --probe for live checks. In an explicit multi-agent setup, workspace-scoped channel plugins come from agents.defaults.systemAgent.agentId. Without that owner, channels list returns the shared bundled, managed, and global inventory with a diagnostic; it does not guess one agent workspace. For add, login, logout, remove, and resolve, or capabilities --channel, use --agent <id> to select the workspace used for channel plugin discovery. The option works before or after the subcommand; a subcommand value takes precedence. Without it, discovery uses the configured System Agent or the existing sole/legacy owner. An explicit fleet with no such owner requires --agent. Selecting a workspace does not create account routing bindings; guided setup asks about routing separately. add, login, logout, and remove also take --account <id>. Omitting it selects the default account. A blank value is rejected instead of falling back to the default, as with the dead-letter commands, so an unset shell variable cannot silently select an account you did not name.

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Status / capabilities / resolve / logs

  • channels status: --channel <name>, --probe, --timeout <ms> (default 10000), --json
  • channels capabilities: --channel <name>, --agent <id>, --account <id> (requires --channel), --target <dest> (requires --channel), --timeout <ms> (default 10000, capped at 30000), --json
  • channels resolve <entries...>: --channel <name>, --account <id>, --agent <id>, --kind <auto|user|group|channel> (default auto), --json
  • channels logs: --channel <name|all> (default all), --lines <n> (default 200), --json
channels logs --channel <name> matches subsystem or module names rooted at <name> or gateway/channels/<name>, including slash-separated descendants. Similar names such as discord-archive do not match discord. channels status --probe is the live path: on a reachable gateway it runs per-account probeAccount and optional auditAccount checks, so output can include transport state plus probe results such as works, probe failed, audit ok, or audit failed. If the gateway is unreachable, channels status falls back to config-only summaries instead of live probe output. channels status does not support --deep; use openclaw channels status --probe for channel checks. The separate top-level openclaw status --deep command provides a broader status probe.

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Inbound dead letters

Inbound events that exhaust their retry policy remain in the shared state database for the queue’s existing failed-entry retention period. Inspect one channel account with:
The text view shows event ids, failure reasons, attempt counts, and failure ages. JSON output also includes the retained payload, metadata, lane, and attempt timestamps for diagnostics. Omitting --account inspects the default account. Both dead-letter commands reject a blank value instead of falling back to default, so an unset shell variable cannot silently select an account you did not name. You can place --account before or after list or resubmit; a value after the leaf command takes precedence. After correcting the underlying problem, re-enqueue one event with its original event id:
Run these commands on the Gateway host so they access the same shared state database as the channel runtime. Resubmission preserves the payload, metadata, and lane, but resets the attempt counter and queue age. It atomically replaces that event’s failed marker, so repeating the command while the event is pending or claimed refuses instead of creating a second dispatch. The running channel picks it up on its next ingress drain. Completed events remain terminal and cannot be resubmitted. Failed rows created before payload retention was added can still appear in the list, but resubmission refuses them because their payload is unavailable. openclaw health reports dead-letter counts and oldest failure age per channel account. openclaw doctor names affected accounts and points back to the inspection command. Do not use openclaw sessions, Gateway sessions.list, or the agent sessions_list tool as a channel socket-health signal. Those surfaces report stored conversation rows, not provider runtime state. After a Discord provider restart, a connected but quiet account may be healthy while no Discord session row appears until the next inbound or outbound conversation event.

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Add / remove accounts

For a headless host, complete non-interactive onboarding first, then add each channel with explicit credential flags or its environment-backed setup option:
--use-env validates the environment variables declared by the selected channel plugin before writing config. For Telegram, the command requires TELEGRAM_BOT_TOKEN; other plugins name their missing variables in the error. The Gateway service must receive the same environment variables as the bootstrap shell. If the Gateway is already running with config reload enabled, it watches the config write and restarts the affected channel automatically. See CLI automation for additional non-interactive provider and Gateway options. Container deployments should also follow the Docker headless bootstrap environment guidance.
openclaw channels add telegram --help or openclaw channels add --channel telegram --help shows only Telegram’s setup flags. openclaw channels add --help shows only the shared command envelope.
channels remove only operates on installed/configured channel plugins. Use channels add first for installable catalog channels. Without --delete it asks to disable the account and keeps its config; --delete removes the config entries without prompting. For runtime-backed channel plugins, channels remove also asks the running Gateway to stop the selected account before it updates config, so disabling or deleting an account does not leave the old listener active until restart. The shared control envelope contains --agent, --channel, --account, and the optional account display --name. Each modern channel plugin owns its credential, transport, and provider-specific semantics. Once a channel is selected by positional id or --channel <id>, the CLI builds only that channel’s options from bundled or installed plugin package metadata without loading channel runtime code. Common-looking flags such as --token, --url, or --use-env are still channel-owned when a modern contract handles them. When a selected third-party plugin still uses the legacy shared setup adapter, core registers the released compatibility flag set for that channel only, alongside its legacy cliAddOptions. Unrelated legacy fields do not leak into other channels, and a modern selected channel rejects compatibility flags it did not declare. Examples of channel-owned flags include: If a channel plugin needs to be installed during a flag-driven add command, OpenClaw uses the channel’s default install source without opening the interactive plugin install prompt. Both guided setup and flag-driven setup pass through the selected channel’s parser, validation, account resolution, config writer, and post-write hooks. Unsupported flags fail with the owning channel’s setup error instead of being accepted through a global input bag. When you run openclaw channels add with no direct account, credential, or channel-config flags, the interactive wizard can prompt. A positional channel id and --channel <id> both open that channel’s guided setup immediately. Back returns to the full channel picker:
Guided setup requires an interactive terminal. In a non-TTY shell, OpenClaw exits immediately instead of waiting for input; use openclaw channels add --channel <id> --use-env or pass the selected plugin’s credential flags. The wizard can prompt for:
  • account ids per selected channel
  • optional display names for those accounts
  • Route these channel accounts to agents now?
If you confirm bind now, the wizard asks which agent should own each configured channel account and writes account-scoped routing bindings. You can also manage the same routing rules later with openclaw agents bindings, openclaw agents bind, and openclaw agents unbind (see agents). When you add a non-default account to a channel that is still using single-account top-level settings, OpenClaw promotes those top-level values into the channel’s account map before writing the new account. Promotion reuses an existing named account when the channel has exactly one, or when defaultAccount points at one; otherwise the values land in channels.<channel>.accounts.default. Routing behavior stays consistent:
  • Existing channel-only bindings (no accountId) continue to match the default account.
  • channels add does not auto-create or rewrite bindings in non-interactive mode.
  • Interactive setup can optionally add account-scoped bindings.
If your config was already in a mixed state (named accounts present and top-level single-account values still set), run openclaw doctor --fix to move account-scoped values into the promoted account chosen for that channel.

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Login and logout (interactive)

Before channels add or channels login writes local credentials or configuration, OpenClaw compares the selected CLI state/config paths with the local Gateway or its installed service. A proven mismatch stops before the write. A remote Gateway or an authenticated path that cannot be verified produces a warning instead.
  • channels login supports --agent <id>, --account <id>, and --verbose; channels logout supports --agent <id> and --account <id>.
  • channels login and logout can infer the channel when only one configured channel supports that action; with several, pass --channel.
  • channels logout prefers the live Gateway path when reachable, so logout stops any active listener before clearing channel auth state. If a local Gateway is not reachable, it falls back to local auth cleanup; with gateway.mode: "remote" the gateway error fails the command instead.
  • Logout reports whether the plugin cleared saved auth. If the plugin reports that the account is not logged out, the CLI warns that other credentials may still be active; this is not a claim that provider-side tokens were revoked.
  • Login and logout base config changes on the authored source, not runtime defaults. A logout with no credentials to clear does not rewrite config merely because runtime defaults were materialized; intentional plugin enablement or installation changes can still be saved.
  • After a successful login, the CLI asks a reachable local Gateway to start the account. If that start is skipped or another lifecycle operation owns the account, it reports the reason and a status command; saved auth is retained. In remote mode it saves auth locally and notes that the remote runtime was not restarted.
  • Run channels login from a terminal on the gateway host. Agent exec blocks this interactive login flow; channel-native agent login tools, such as whatsapp_login, should be used from chat when available.

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Per-account recovery (non-destructive)

When one account needs to reconnect while keeping its pairing and credentials, call the channels.stop and channels.start Gateway RPCs. Both require operator.admin. Invoke them through openclaw gateway call:
Use the same accountId in both calls. Omit it from both to select the default account. channels.stop returns { channel, accountId, stopped }; channels.start returns { channel, accountId, started, outcome }. These booleans reflect the account’s runtime snapshot after the operation: started is true only when running is true, and stopped is true when running is not true. A started: false response does not by itself establish that the account is stopped, and started: true does not establish that the provider connection is healthy. Check channel status and logs after recovery. outcome explains the lifecycle owner’s decision for the requested account:
  • { status: "handed-off" }: startup was handed to the account runtime. Check status for provider connectivity.
  • { status: "retry", reason }: an existing task, start, or stop still owns the account (task-owned, start-in-flight, or stop-in-flight). A running account can return task-owned with started: true; another start was unnecessary. Wait for an in-flight stop to finish before starting again.
  • { status: "skipped", reason }: startup was skipped, for example because the account is disabled, unconfigured, or unlinked. Repair the named account condition before retrying. Other manager reasons are unsupported, autostart-suppressed, ambient-suppressed, secret-unavailable, and manual-stop; the manual RPC bypasses automatic-start suppression but does not bypass account configuration or secret checks.
Accounts explicitly disabled in channel or account configuration are skipped without resolving inactive credentials. An unavailable configured secret on an enabled account still returns an RPC error instead of starting with another credential. Unlike this recovery path, openclaw channels logout clears the account’s credentials and requires login again; openclaw gateway restart restarts the whole Gateway. See Restart recovery for the crash-loop breaker and its manual channels.start override.

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Troubleshooting

  • Run openclaw status --deep for a broad probe.
  • Use openclaw doctor for guided fixes.
  • openclaw channels status falls back to config-only summaries when the gateway is unreachable. If a supported channel credential is configured via SecretRef but unavailable in the current command path, it reports that account as configured with degraded notes instead of showing it as not configured.

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Capabilities probe

Fetch provider capability hints (intents/scopes where available) plus static feature support:
Notes:
  • --channel is optional; omit it to list every channel (including plugin-provided channels).
  • --account is only valid with --channel.
  • Each account probe and diagnostics step has its own timeout. A stalled step is reported in both text and JSON output, and the command continues with the remaining accounts.
  • --target accepts channel:<id> or a raw numeric channel id and only applies to Discord. For Discord voice channels, the permission check flags missing ViewChannel, Connect, Speak, SendMessages, and ReadMessageHistory.
  • Probes are provider-specific: Discord bot identity + intents plus optional channel permissions; Slack bot + user scopes; Telegram bot flags + webhook; Signal daemon version; Microsoft Teams app token + Graph roles/scopes (annotated where known). Channels without probes report Probe: unavailable.

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Resolve names to IDs

Resolve channel/user names to IDs using the provider directory:
Notes:
  • In multi-agent configurations, use --agent <id> in either parent or leaf position to select the agent-owned workspace and channel plugin context.
  • Use --kind user|group|channel|auto to force the target type.
  • Resolution prefers active matches when multiple entries share the same name.
  • channels resolve is read-only. If a selected account is configured via SecretRef but that credential is unavailable in the current command path, the command returns degraded unresolved results with notes instead of aborting the entire run.
  • channels resolve does not install channel plugins. Use channels add --channel <name> before resolving names for an installable catalog channel.