Channels & routing

OpenClaw routes replies back to the channel where a message came from. The model does not choose a channel; routing is deterministic and controlled by the host configuration. Under the default DM scope, direct messages from every channel converge on the agent's main session.

Key terms

• Channel: a bundled channel plugin such as discord, googlechat, imessage, irc, line, signal, slack, telegram, or whatsapp, plus installed plugin channels. webchat is the internal WebChat UI channel and is not a configurable outbound channel.
• AccountId: per-channel account instance (when supported).
• Optional channel default account: channels.<channel>.defaultAccount chooses which account is used when an outbound path does not specify accountId.
  • In multi-account setups, set an explicit default (defaultAccount or an account named default) when two or more accounts are configured. Without it, fallback routing may pick the first normalized account ID.
• AgentId: an isolated workspace + session store ("brain").
• SessionKey: the bucket key used to store context and control concurrency.

Outbound target prefixes

Explicit outbound targets may include a provider prefix, such as telegram:123 or tg:123. Core treats that prefix as a channel-selection hint only when the selected channel is last or otherwise unresolved, and only when the loaded plugin advertises that prefix. If the caller already selected an explicit channel, the provider prefix must match that channel; cross-channel combinations such as WhatsApp delivery to telegram:123 fail before plugin-specific target normalization.

Target-kind and service prefixes such as channel:<id>, user:<id>, room:<id>, thread:<id>, imessage:<handle>, and sms:<number> stay inside the selected channel's grammar. They do not select the provider by themselves.

Session key shapes (examples)

Direct messages collapse to the agent's main session by default:

• agent:<agentId>:<mainKey> (default: agent:main:main)

session.dmScope controls DM collapsing: main (default) shares one main session, while per-peer, per-channel-peer, and per-account-channel-peer keep DMs in separate sessions. A route binding can override the scope for its matched peers via bindings[].session.dmScope.

Even when direct-message conversation history is shared with main, sandbox and tool policy use a derived per-account direct-chat runtime key for external DMs so channel-originated messages are not treated like local main-session runs.

Groups and channels remain isolated per channel:

• Groups: agent:<agentId>:<channel>:group:<id>
• Channels/rooms: agent:<agentId>:<channel>:channel:<id>

Threads:

• Slack/Discord threads append :thread:<threadId> to the base key.
• Telegram forum topics embed :topic:<topicId> in the group key.

Examples:

• agent:main:telegram:group:-1001234567890:topic:42
• agent:main:discord:channel:123456:thread:987654

Main DM route pinning

When session.dmScope is main, direct messages may share one main session. To prevent the session's lastRoute from being overwritten by non-owner DMs, OpenClaw infers a pinned owner from allowFrom when all of these are true:

• allowFrom has exactly one non-wildcard entry.
• The entry can be normalized to a concrete sender ID for that channel.
• The inbound DM sender does not match that pinned owner.

In that mismatch case, OpenClaw still records inbound session metadata, but it skips updating the main session lastRoute.

Guarded inbound recording

Channel plugins can mark an inbound session record as createIfMissing: false when a guarded path must not create a new OpenClaw session. In that mode, OpenClaw may update metadata and lastRoute for an existing session, but it does not create a route-only session entry just because a message was observed.

Routing rules (how an agent is chosen)

Routing picks one agent for each inbound message:

1. Exact peer match (bindings with peer.kind + peer.id).
2. Parent peer match (thread inheritance).
3. Peer wildcard match (peer.id: "*" for a peer kind).
4. Guild + roles match (Discord) via guildId + roles.
5. Guild match (Discord) via guildId.
6. Team match (Slack) via teamId.
7. Account match (accountId on the channel).
8. Channel match (any account on that channel, accountId: "*").
9. Default agent (agents.list[].default, else first list entry, fallback to main).

When a binding includes multiple match fields (peer, guildId, teamId, roles), all provided fields must match for that binding to apply.

The matched agent determines which workspace and session store are used.

Broadcast groups (run multiple agents)

Broadcast groups let you run multiple agents for the same peer when OpenClaw would normally reply (for example: in WhatsApp groups, after mention/activation gating).

Config:

{
  broadcast: {
    strategy: "parallel",
    "120363403215116621@g.us": ["alfred", "baerbel"],
    "+15555550123": ["support", "logger"],
  },
}

See: Broadcast Groups.

Config overview

• agents.list: named agent definitions (workspace, model, etc.).
• bindings: map inbound channels/accounts/peers to agents.

Example:

{
  agents: {
    list: [{ id: "support", name: "Support", workspace: "~/.openclaw/workspace-support" }],
  },
  bindings: [
    { match: { channel: "slack", teamId: "T123" }, agentId: "support" },
    { match: { channel: "telegram", peer: { kind: "group", id: "-100123" } }, agentId: "support" },
  ],
}

Session storage

Runtime session rows live in each agent's SQLite database under the state directory (default ~/.openclaw):

• ~/.openclaw/agents/<agentId>/agent/openclaw-agent.sqlite

Older installs may have legacy transcript JSONL files and a sessions.json row store under ~/.openclaw/agents/<agentId>/sessions/. Gateway startup and openclaw doctor --fix import hot legacy rows/history into SQLite automatically. Use openclaw doctor --session-sqlite inspect --session-sqlite-all-agents and the Doctor validation sequence when you need explicit migration evidence. You can still select a legacy store path via session.store and {agentId} templating for migration and offline-maintenance workflows.

Gateway and ACP session discovery also scans disk-backed agent stores under the default agents/ root and under templated session.store roots. Discovered stores must stay inside that resolved agent root and use a regular legacy sessions.json file. Symlinks and out-of-root paths are ignored.

WebChat behavior

WebChat attaches to the selected agent and defaults to the agent's main session. Because of this, WebChat lets you see cross-channel context for that agent in one place.

Reply context

Inbound replies include:

• ReplyToId, ReplyToBody, and ReplyToSender when available.
• Quoted context is appended to Body as a [Replying to ...] block.

This is consistent across channels.

Related

• Groups
• Broadcast groups
• Pairing

Source: docs/channels/channel-routing.md