Which Messaging Apps Does OpenClaw Support?

Introduction

One of OpenClaw's most distinctive design decisions is its choice of interface. Rather than building a dedicated app, OpenClaw plugs into the messaging platforms you already live in. Your AI agent appears in the same list as your family group chat, your work colleagues, your closest friends. It's there when you need it — no tab switching, no new app to remember, no context shift.

This "ambient computing" approach is what Peter Steinberger identified as the core UX insight behind the project. The friction of modern AI tools wasn't the AI itself — it was the ritual of going somewhere specific to access it. OpenClaw solved this by bringing the AI to where people already are.

Here's what we're covering: every messaging channel OpenClaw supports, how each integration works, and how to choose the right one for your situation.

Why Messaging Apps?

The decision to build around messaging platforms was strategic and forward-looking. Messaging apps have become the dominant communication interface for billions of people. WhatsApp has over 2 billion active users. Telegram serves hundreds of millions. Slack is the operating system of professional teams. These platforms are already open, already running, and already on every device you own.

By plugging into these platforms, OpenClaw inherits their properties: cross-platform availability, notification systems, persistent conversation history, voice note support (on some channels), and the familiar interaction patterns people use every day. You don't need to teach someone how to use OpenClaw — if they know how to send a message, they know how to use it.

There's also a privacy dimension. Messages to your OpenClaw bot through Telegram or WhatsApp are end-to-end encrypted in transit (at the platform layer). The bot itself runs on your hardware, so the actual intelligence never passes through third-party AI servers unless you're using cloud LLM providers. For local model deployments, the entire interaction can remain on your network.

Telegram Integration

Telegram is OpenClaw's flagship channel and the one with the most mature integration. It's also the easiest to set up, which is why the vast majority of tutorials and community projects use Telegram as their primary interface.

Setup requires creating a bot via Telegram's official BotFather service — a process that takes about five minutes and produces a bot token. This token goes into OpenClaw's config file, and the integration works immediately. No webhook configuration needed; OpenClaw polls Telegram's API by default (or you can configure webhooks for lower latency).

Telegram's feature set makes it particularly well-suited for an AI agent interface. It supports rich text formatting with Markdown, inline buttons for interactive responses, file attachments up to 2GB, voice notes, location sharing, and inline keyboards for menu-driven interactions. Community Skills have extended this to include interactive dashboards where your agent sends formatted reports with collapsible sections.

One key security configuration: always set allowed_user_ids in your Telegram config. This restricts your bot to responding only to your account. Without this, anyone who discovers your bot's username can send it commands. Given that OpenClaw agents have shell and filesystem access, this is not a theoretical risk.

WhatsApp Integration

WhatsApp integration is more complex but opens OpenClaw up to the largest messaging user base in the world. There are two approaches: using WhatsApp Business API (official, paid) or using community-built bridges (unofficial, free).

The official WhatsApp Business API is the recommended approach for professional use. It provides stable, reliable message delivery, full compliance with WhatsApp's terms of service, and support for rich message types including buttons and list menus. The trade-off is cost: the Business API charges per conversation and requires registration through a Meta Business account.

The unofficial bridge approach uses libraries like Baileys to interface with WhatsApp Web. This works and is widely used in the OpenClaw community, but it violates WhatsApp's terms of service and carries the risk of account suspension. It's appropriate for personal experimentation, not for production deployments or business use.

For most personal users who want OpenClaw on WhatsApp, the unofficial bridge approach works reliably on a day-to-day basis with low ban risk if the bot usage is indistinguishable from normal human messaging patterns. Keep message volumes reasonable and avoid spammy behavior.

Slack Integration

Slack integration makes OpenClaw particularly compelling for professional and team use cases. An OpenClaw agent in a Slack workspace can monitor channels, respond to mentions, participate in threads, and post proactive reports — all while appearing as a named bot user that team members can interact with naturally.

Setup requires creating a Slack app through Slack's developer portal, configuring the necessary OAuth scopes (message reading, posting, channel access), and adding the bot token to OpenClaw's configuration. The Slack integration supports all of Slack's rich formatting features — bold, italics, code blocks, attachment cards, and interactive Block Kit components.

A common enterprise use case: running an OpenClaw agent that monitors a #production-alerts channel, parses incoming error messages, and either posts a suggested fix or — with appropriate Skills configured — actually deploys the fix autonomously. Teams using this pattern have reported that overnight incident resolution without human pages has become routine.

For teams running OpenClaw via Slack, the security configuration is especially important. Define which channels and users the agent can read and respond to. Restrict shell Skills to specific allowlisted commands. The blast radius of a misconfigured agent with Slack access to sensitive channels is significant.

Discord, iMessage & More

Beyond the three primary channels, OpenClaw supports several additional platforms through community-contributed Channel Adapters.

Discord: A popular channel for developers and gamers. The Discord integration works similarly to Telegram, using bot tokens and allowing the agent to participate in server channels or direct messages. Discord's threading and category system makes it well-suited for organizing multi-topic agent interactions.

iMessage / Apple Messages: The iMessage bridge uses AppleScript or the Messages app's automation APIs on macOS. It works specifically on Mac hardware and allows your OpenClaw agent to communicate through your regular iMessage conversations. This is particularly elegant for Apple users — your AI assistant appears alongside your real contacts, accessible from iPhone, iPad, or Mac.

Signal: A community-developed adapter enables Signal integration for users who prioritize end-to-end encryption above all else. Signal's architecture makes bot development more complex than Telegram, but the privacy benefits are significant for sensitive deployments.

SMS: Through Twilio or similar telephony APIs, OpenClaw can send and receive SMS messages. This is the most universally accessible channel — anyone with a phone number can interact with the agent — and is particularly useful for client-facing deployments where asking users to install a specific messaging app isn't feasible.

Email: While not a traditional "messaging app," email is supported through SMTP/IMAP Skills. Your agent can be configured to respond to emails sent to a specific address and to proactively send emails as part of its tasks.

Choosing the Right Channel

The right channel depends on your primary use case, technical comfort level, and who will be interacting with the agent:

For a first deployment, start with Telegram. The setup is fastest, the community documentation is most extensive, and the feature set is the richest. Once you're comfortable with how OpenClaw works, adding additional channels is straightforward — you can run multiple channels simultaneously from a single OpenClaw instance.

Wrapping Up

OpenClaw's messaging-first architecture is one of its core innovations. By embedding AI assistance into the platforms people already use, it removes the context-switching friction that limits how useful traditional web-based AI tools. Whether you prefer Telegram's developer-friendly richness, WhatsApp's ubiquity, Slack's professional integration, or iMessage's smooth Apple experience, OpenClaw meets you where you already are. That's not a minor feature — it's a fundamental redesign of what human-AI interaction can feel like.