OpenClaw

OpenClaw 🦞

OpenClaw

OpenClaw

Any OS gateway for AI agents across Discord, Google Chat, iMessage, Matrix, Microsoft Teams, Signal, Slack, Telegram, WhatsApp, Zalo, and more.
Send a message, get an agent response from your pocket. Run one Gateway across built-in channels, bundled channel plugins, WebChat, and mobile nodes.

What is OpenClaw?

OpenClaw is a self-hosted gateway that connects your favorite chat apps and channel surfaces — built-in channels plus bundled or external channel plugins such as Discord, Google Chat, iMessage, Matrix, Microsoft Teams, Signal, Slack, Telegram, WhatsApp, Zalo, and more — to AI coding agents like Pi. You run a single Gateway process on your own machine (or a server), and it becomes the bridge between your messaging apps and an always-available AI assistant.

Who is it for? Developers and power users who want a personal AI assistant they can message from anywhere — without giving up control of their data or relying on a hosted service.

What makes it different?

• Self-hosted: runs on your hardware, your rules
• Multi-channel: one Gateway serves built-in channels plus bundled or external channel plugins simultaneously
• Agent-native: built for coding agents with tool use, sessions, memory, and multi-agent routing
• Open source: MIT licensed, community-driven

What do you need? Node 24 (recommended), or Node 22 LTS (

How it works

mermaid
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flowchart LR
  A["Chat apps + plugins"] --> B["Gateway"]
  B --> C["Pi agent"]
  B --> D["CLI"]
  B --> E["Web Control UI"]
  B --> F["macOS app"]
  B --> G["iOS and Android nodes"]

The Gateway is the single source of truth for sessions, routing, and channel connections.

Key capabilities

Quick start

text
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```bash}
openclaw dashboard
```

Or connect a channel ([Telegram](/channels/telegram) is fastest) and chat from your phone.

Need the full install and dev setup? See Getting Started.

Dashboard

Open the browser Control UI after the Gateway starts.

• Local default: http://127.0.0.1:18789/
• Remote access: Web surfaces and Tailscale

OpenClaw

Configuration (optional)

Config lives at

• If you do nothing, OpenClaw uses the bundled Pi binary in RPC mode with per-sender sessions.
• If you want to lock it down, start with
  text

  Copy

  channels.whatsapp.allowFrom
  and (for groups) mention rules.

Example:

json5
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{
  channels: {
    whatsapp: {
      allowFrom: ["+15555550123"],
      groups: { "*": { requireMention: true } },
    },
  },
  messages: { groupChat: { mentionPatterns: ["@openclaw"] } },
}

Start here

Learn more