Hooks

Hooks are small scripts that run when something happens inside the Gateway. They can be discovered from directories and inspected with openclaw hooks. The Gateway loads internal hooks only after you enable hooks or configure at least one hook entry, hook pack, legacy handler, or extra hook directory.

There are two kinds of hooks in OpenClaw:

• Internal hooks (this page): run inside the Gateway when agent events fire, like /new, /reset, /stop, or lifecycle events.
• Webhooks: external HTTP endpoints that let other systems trigger work in OpenClaw. See Webhooks.

Hooks can also be bundled inside plugins. openclaw hooks list shows both standalone hooks and plugin-managed hooks.

Quick start

# List available hooks
openclaw hooks list

# Enable a hook
openclaw hooks enable session-memory

# Check hook status
openclaw hooks check

# Get detailed information
openclaw hooks info session-memory

Event types

Writing hooks

Hook structure

Each hook is a directory containing two files:

my-hook/
├── HOOK.md          # Metadata + documentation
└── handler.ts       # Handler implementation

HOOK.md format

---
name: my-hook
description: "Short description of what this hook does"
metadata:
  { "openclaw": { "emoji": "🔗", "events": ["command:new"], "requires": { "bins": ["node"] } } }
---

# My Hook

Detailed documentation goes here.

Metadata fields (metadata.openclaw):

Handler implementation

const handler = async (event) => {
  if (event.type !== "command" || event.action !== "new") {
    return;
  }

  console.log(`[my-hook] New command triggered`);
  // Your logic here

  // Optionally send message to user
  event.messages.push("Hook executed!");
};

export default handler;

Each event includes: type, action, sessionKey, timestamp, messages (push to send to user), and context (event-specific data). Agent and tool plugin hook contexts can also include trace, a read-only W3C-compatible diagnostic trace context that plugins may pass into structured logs for OTEL correlation.

Event context highlights

Command events (command:new, command:reset): context.sessionEntry, context.previousSessionEntry, context.commandSource, context.workspaceDir, context.cfg.

Message events (message:received): context.from, context.content, context.channelId, context.metadata (provider-specific data including senderId, senderName, guildId). context.content prefers a nonblank command body for command-like messages, then falls back to the raw inbound body and generic body; it does not include agent-only enrichment such as thread history or link summaries.

Message events (message:sent): context.to, context.content, context.success, context.channelId.

Message events (message:transcribed): context.transcript, context.from, context.channelId, context.mediaPath.

Message events (message:preprocessed): context.bodyForAgent (final enriched body), context.from, context.channelId.

Bootstrap events (agent:bootstrap): context.bootstrapFiles (mutable array), context.agentId.

Session patch events (session:patch): context.sessionEntry, context.patch (only changed fields), context.cfg. Only privileged clients can trigger patch events.

Compaction events: session:compact:before includes messageCount, tokenCount. session:compact:after adds compactedCount, summaryLength, tokensBefore, tokensAfter.

command:stop observes the user issuing /stop; it is cancellation/command lifecycle, not an agent-finalization gate. Plugins that need to inspect a natural final answer and ask the agent for one more pass should use the typed plugin hook before_agent_finalize instead. See Plugin hooks.

Gateway lifecycle events: gateway:shutdown includes reason and restartExpectedMs and fires when gateway shutdown begins. gateway:pre-restart includes the same context but only fires when shutdown is part of an expected restart and a finite restartExpectedMs value is supplied. During shutdown, each lifecycle hook wait is best-effort and bounded so shutdown continues if a handler stalls.

Hook discovery

Hooks are discovered from these directories, in order of increasing override precedence:

1. Bundled hooks: shipped with OpenClaw
2. Plugin hooks: hooks bundled inside installed plugins
3. Managed hooks: ~/.openclaw/hooks/ (user-installed, shared across workspaces). Extra directories from hooks.internal.load.extraDirs share this precedence.
4. Workspace hooks: <workspace>/hooks/ (per-agent, disabled by default until explicitly enabled)

Workspace hooks can add new hook names but cannot override bundled, managed, or plugin-provided hooks with the same name.

The Gateway skips internal hook discovery on startup until internal hooks are configured. Enable a bundled or managed hook with openclaw hooks enable <name>, install a hook pack, or set hooks.internal.enabled=true to opt in. When you enable one named hook, the Gateway loads only that hook's handler; hooks.internal.enabled=true, extra hook directories, and legacy handlers opt into broad discovery.

Hook packs

Hook packs are npm packages that export hooks via openclaw.hooks in package.json. Install with:

openclaw plugins install <path-or-spec>

Npm specs are registry-only (package name + optional exact version or dist-tag). Git/URL/file specs and semver ranges are rejected.

Bundled hooks

Enable any bundled hook:

openclaw hooks enable <hook-name>

<a id="session-memory"></a>

session-memory details

Extracts the last 15 user/assistant messages and saves to <workspace>/memory/YYYY-MM-DD-HHMM.md using the host local date. Memory capture runs in the background so /new and /reset acknowledgements are not delayed by transcript reads or optional slug generation. Set hooks.internal.entries.session-memory.llmSlug: true to generate descriptive filename slugs with the configured model. Requires workspace.dir to be configured.

<a id="bootstrap-extra-files"></a>

bootstrap-extra-files config

{
  "hooks": {
    "internal": {
      "entries": {
        "bootstrap-extra-files": {
          "enabled": true,
          "paths": ["packages/*/AGENTS.md", "packages/*/TOOLS.md"]
        }
      }
    }
  }
}

Paths resolve relative to workspace. Only recognized bootstrap basenames are loaded (AGENTS.md, SOUL.md, TOOLS.md, IDENTITY.md, USER.md, HEARTBEAT.md, BOOTSTRAP.md, MEMORY.md).

<a id="command-logger"></a>

command-logger details

Logs every slash command to ~/.openclaw/logs/commands.log.

<a id="compaction-notifier"></a>

compaction-notifier details

Sends short status messages into the current conversation when OpenClaw starts and finishes compacting the session transcript. This makes long turns less confusing on chat surfaces because the user can see that the assistant is summarizing context and will continue after compaction.

<a id="boot-md"></a>

boot-md details

Runs BOOT.md from the active workspace when the gateway starts.

Plugin hooks

Plugins can register typed hooks through the Plugin SDK for deeper integration: intercepting tool calls, modifying prompts, controlling message flow, and more. Use plugin hooks when you need before_tool_call, before_agent_reply, before_install, or other in-process lifecycle hooks.

For the complete plugin hook reference, see Plugin hooks.

Configuration

{
  "hooks": {
    "internal": {
      "enabled": true,
      "entries": {
        "session-memory": { "enabled": true },
        "command-logger": { "enabled": false }
      }
    }
  }
}

Per-hook environment variables:

{
  "hooks": {
    "internal": {
      "entries": {
        "my-hook": {
          "enabled": true,
          "env": { "MY_CUSTOM_VAR": "value" }
        }
      }
    }
  }
}

Extra hook directories:

{
  "hooks": {
    "internal": {
      "load": {
        "extraDirs": ["/path/to/more/hooks"]
      }
    }
  }
}

CLI reference

# List all hooks (add --eligible, --verbose, or --json)
openclaw hooks list

# Show detailed info about a hook
openclaw hooks info <hook-name>

# Show eligibility summary
openclaw hooks check

# Enable/disable
openclaw hooks enable <hook-name>
openclaw hooks disable <hook-name>

Best practices

• Keep handlers fast. Hooks run during command processing. Fire-and-forget heavy work with void processInBackground(event).
• Handle errors gracefully. Wrap risky operations in try/catch; do not throw so other handlers can run.
• Filter events early. Return immediately if the event type/action is not relevant.
• Use specific event keys. Prefer "events": ["command:new"] over "events": ["command"] to reduce overhead.

Troubleshooting

Hook not discovered

# Verify directory structure
ls -la ~/.openclaw/hooks/my-hook/
# Should show: HOOK.md, handler.ts

# List all discovered hooks
openclaw hooks list

Hook not eligible

openclaw hooks info my-hook

Check for missing binaries (PATH), environment variables, config values, or OS compatibility.

Hook not executing

1. Verify the hook is enabled: openclaw hooks list
2. Restart your gateway process so hooks reload.
3. Check gateway logs: ./scripts/clawlog.sh | grep hook

Related

• CLI Reference: hooks
• Webhooks
• Plugin hooks — in-process plugin lifecycle hooks
• Configuration