Broadcast groups

Overview

Broadcast Groups enable multiple agents to process and respond to the same message simultaneously. This allows you to create specialized agent teams that work together in a single WhatsApp group or DM — all using one phone number.

Current scope: WhatsApp only (web channel).

Broadcast groups are evaluated after channel allowlists and group activation rules. In WhatsApp groups, this means broadcasts happen when OpenClaw would normally reply (for example: on mention, depending on your group settings).

Use cases

Group: "Development Team"Agents:  - CodeReviewer (reviews code snippets)  - DocumentationBot (generates docs)  - SecurityAuditor (checks for vulnerabilities)  - TestGenerator (suggests test cases)

Group: "International Support"Agents:  - Agent_EN (responds in English)  - Agent_DE (responds in German)  - Agent_ES (responds in Spanish)

Group: "Customer Support"Agents:  - SupportAgent (provides answer)  - QAAgent (reviews quality, only responds if issues found)

Group: "Project Management"Agents:  - TaskTracker (updates task database)  - TimeLogger (logs time spent)  - ReportGenerator (creates summaries)

Configuration

Basic setup

Add a top-level broadcast section (next to bindings). Keys are WhatsApp peer ids:

• group chats: group JID (e.g. 120363403215116621@g.us)
• DMs: E.164 phone number (e.g. +15551234567)

{  "broadcast": {    "120363403215116621@g.us": ["alfred", "baerbel", "assistant3"]  }}

Result: When OpenClaw would reply in this chat, it will run all three agents.

Processing strategy

Control how agents process messages:

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

{  "broadcast": {    "strategy": "sequential",    "120363403215116621@g.us": ["alfred", "baerbel"]  }}

Complete example

{  "agents": {    "list": [      {        "id": "code-reviewer",        "name": "Code Reviewer",        "workspace": "/path/to/code-reviewer",        "sandbox": { "mode": "all" }      },      {        "id": "security-auditor",        "name": "Security Auditor",        "workspace": "/path/to/security-auditor",        "sandbox": { "mode": "all" }      },      {        "id": "docs-generator",        "name": "Documentation Generator",        "workspace": "/path/to/docs-generator",        "sandbox": { "mode": "all" }      }    ]  },  "broadcast": {    "strategy": "parallel",    "120363403215116621@g.us": ["code-reviewer", "security-auditor", "docs-generator"],    "120363424282127706@g.us": ["support-en", "support-de"],    "+15555550123": ["assistant", "logger"]  }}

How it works

Message flow

Session isolation

Each agent in a broadcast group maintains completely separate:

• Session keys (agent:alfred:whatsapp:group:120363... vs agent:baerbel:whatsapp:group:120363...)
• Conversation history (agent doesn't see other agents' messages)
• Workspace (separate sandboxes if configured)
• Tool access (different allow/deny lists)
• Memory/context (separate IDENTITY.md, SOUL.md, etc.)
• Group context buffer (recent group messages used for context) is shared per peer, so all broadcast agents see the same context when triggered

This allows each agent to have:

• Different personalities
• Different tool access (e.g., read-only vs. read-write)
• Different models (e.g., opus vs. sonnet)
• Different skills installed

Example: isolated sessions

In group 120363403215116621@g.us with agents ["alfred", "baerbel"]:

Session: agent:alfred:whatsapp:group:120363403215116621@g.usHistory: [user message, alfred's previous responses]Workspace: /Users/user/openclaw-alfred/Tools: read, write, exec

Session: agent:baerbel:whatsapp:group:120363403215116621@g.usHistory: [user message, baerbel's previous responses]Workspace: /Users/user/openclaw-baerbel/Tools: read only

Best practices

{  "broadcast": {    "DEV_GROUP": ["formatter", "linter", "tester"]  }}

{  "agents": {    "security-scanner": { "name": "Security Scanner" },    "code-formatter": { "name": "Code Formatter" },    "test-generator": { "name": "Test Generator" }  }}

{  "agents": {    "reviewer": {      "tools": { "allow": ["read", "exec"] }    },    "fixer": {      "tools": { "allow": ["read", "write", "edit", "exec"] }    }  }}

Message → [Agent A ✓, Agent B ✗ error, Agent C ✓]Result: Agent A and C respond, Agent B logs error

Compatibility

Providers

Broadcast groups currently work with:

• ✅ WhatsApp (implemented)
• 🚧 Telegram (planned)
• 🚧 Discord (planned)
• 🚧 Slack (planned)

Routing

Broadcast groups work alongside existing routing:

{  "bindings": [    {      "match": { "channel": "whatsapp", "peer": { "kind": "group", "id": "GROUP_A" } },      "agentId": "alfred"    }  ],  "broadcast": {    "GROUP_B": ["agent1", "agent2"]  }}

• GROUP_A: Only alfred responds (normal routing).
• GROUP_B: agent1 AND agent2 respond (broadcast).

Troubleshooting

tail -f ~/.openclaw/logs/gateway.log | grep broadcast

Examples

{  "broadcast": {    "strategy": "parallel",    "120363403215116621@g.us": [      "code-formatter",      "security-scanner",      "test-coverage",      "docs-checker"    ]  },  "agents": {    "list": [      {        "id": "code-formatter",        "workspace": "~/agents/formatter",        "tools": { "allow": ["read", "write"] }      },      {        "id": "security-scanner",        "workspace": "~/agents/security",        "tools": { "allow": ["read", "exec"] }      },      {        "id": "test-coverage",        "workspace": "~/agents/testing",        "tools": { "allow": ["read", "exec"] }      },      { "id": "docs-checker", "workspace": "~/agents/docs", "tools": { "allow": ["read"] } }    ]  }}

{  "broadcast": {    "strategy": "sequential",    "+15555550123": ["detect-language", "translator-en", "translator-de"]  },  "agents": {    "list": [      { "id": "detect-language", "workspace": "~/agents/lang-detect" },      { "id": "translator-en", "workspace": "~/agents/translate-en" },      { "id": "translator-de", "workspace": "~/agents/translate-de" }    ]  }}

API reference

Config schema

interface OpenClawConfig {  broadcast?: {    strategy?: "parallel" | "sequential";    [peerId: string]: string[];  };}

Fields

Limitations

1. Max agents: No hard limit, but 10+ agents may be slow.
2. Shared context: Agents don't see each other's responses (by design).
3. Message ordering: Parallel responses may arrive in any order.
4. Rate limits: All agents count toward WhatsApp rate limits.

Future enhancements

Planned features:

• [ ] Shared context mode (agents see each other's responses)
• [ ] Agent coordination (agents can signal each other)
• [ ] Dynamic agent selection (choose agents based on message content)
• [ ] Agent priorities (some agents respond before others)

Related

• Channel routing
• Groups
• Multi-agent sandbox tools
• Pairing
• Session management