Multiple Agents, One Install

Before You StartPrerequisites

A working OpenClaw install with at least one agent already running on Telegram. That's it — your agent handles the config changes for you.

Back up my current OpenClaw config before we make any changes. Save a copy somewhere safe.

The Mental ModelHow It Works

Think of it like departments in a company. Each agent has its own bot, its own chat, and its own job. You message them separately — just like texting different people.

One machine. Multiple agents. Each with their own number.

Step 1 of 3Create a New Telegram Bot

Open Telegram and message @BotFather. Send /newbot, give it a name and username, and copy the bot token it gives you.

This is the only manual step. Everything else, your agent handles.

Step 2 of 3Tell Your Agent to Add the New Bot

Send this to your main agent. It will add the new Telegram bot token to your config and create a binding that routes messages from that bot to a new agent.

I created a new Telegram bot for a second agent. The bot token is: [PASTE YOUR TOKEN HERE]

Add this as a new Telegram account called "research" in my config, and create a binding that routes it to a new agent called "research". Don't restart yet — I want to set up the agent first.

Your agent will update channels.telegram.accounts and bindings in your config. Here's what the relevant sections look like after the change:

{
  "channels": {
    "telegram": {
      "accounts": {
        "default": {
          "token": "YOUR_EXISTING_BOT_TOKEN"
        },
        "research": {
          "token": "YOUR_NEW_BOT_TOKEN"
        }
      }
    }
  },

  "bindings": [
    {
      "channel": "telegram",
      "accountId": "default",
      "agentId": "main"
    },
    {
      "channel": "telegram",
      "accountId": "research",
      "agentId": "research"
    }
  ]
}

Step 3 of 3Tell Your Agent to Create the New Agent

Now tell your agent to register the new agent instance with its own workspace, and restart the gateway.

Add a new agent instance called "research" with its own workspace at ~/.openclaw/workspace-research. Then restart the gateway so it picks up all the changes.

Your agent will add the instance to agents.instances and restart. Here's what that section looks like:

{
  "agents": {
    "instances": {
      "main": {
        "workspace": "~/.openclaw/workspace"
      },
      "research": {
        "workspace": "~/.openclaw/workspace-research"
      }
    }
  }
}

After the restart, message the new bot on Telegram. It's a completely separate agent with its own conversation history.

Create a SOUL.md file in ~/.openclaw/workspace-research for the new research agent. Make it a focused research assistant — thorough, cites sources, good at summarizing long documents. Keep it concise.

The ShortcutThe All-in-One Prompt

If you prefer, you can do all three config steps in a single message to your agent:

I want to add a second agent. Here's what I need:

1. Back up my current config first
2. Add a new Telegram bot token: [PASTE TOKEN HERE]
3. Register it as account "research" and bind it to a new agent called "research"
4. Create the agent instance with workspace at ~/.openclaw/workspace-research
5. Create a SOUL.md for it — make it a research assistant that's thorough and good at summarizing
6. Restart the gateway when everything is ready

Enable agent-to-agent communication between "main" and "research" so they can message each other.

I created a Telegram group with both bots. The group ID is [GROUP_ID]. Allowlist it in the config with requireMention set to true so they only respond when @mentioned.

Set the research agent to use a cheaper model — something fast and cost-effective. Keep the main agent on the current model.