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openclaw/docs/automation/tasks.md

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Background task tracking for ACP runs, subagents, isolated cron jobs, and CLI operations
Inspecting background work in progress or recently completed
Debugging delivery failures for detached agent runs
Understanding how background runs relate to sessions, cron, and heartbeat
Background Tasks

Background Tasks

Cron vs Heartbeat vs Tasks? See Cron vs Heartbeat for choosing the right scheduling mechanism. This page covers tracking background work, not scheduling it.

Background tasks track work that runs outside your main conversation session: ACP runs, subagent spawns, isolated cron job executions, and CLI-initiated operations.

Tasks do not replace sessions, cron jobs, or heartbeats — they are the activity ledger that records what detached work happened, when, and whether it succeeded.

Not every agent run creates a task. Heartbeat turns and main-session cron reminders stay in main-session history. Only **detached** work appears in the task ledger.

TL;DR

  • Tasks are records, not schedulers — cron and heartbeat decide when work runs, tasks track what happened.
  • Only detached work creates tasks: ACP, subagents, isolated cron, CLI operations.
  • Each task moves through queued → running → terminal (succeeded, failed, timed_out, cancelled, or lost).
  • Completion notifications are delivered directly to a channel or queued for the next heartbeat.
  • openclaw tasks list shows all tasks; openclaw tasks audit surfaces issues.
  • Terminal records are kept for 7 days, then automatically pruned.

Quick start

# List all tasks (newest first)
openclaw tasks list

# Filter by runtime or status
openclaw tasks list --runtime acp
openclaw tasks list --status running

# Show details for a specific task (by ID, run ID, or session key)
openclaw tasks show <lookup>

# Cancel a running task (kills the child session)
openclaw tasks cancel <lookup>

# Change notification policy for a task
openclaw tasks notify <lookup> state_changes

# Run a health audit
openclaw tasks audit

What creates a task

Source Runtime type When a task record is created
ACP background runs acp Spawning a child ACP session
Subagent orchestration subagent Spawning a subagent via sessions_spawn
Isolated cron jobs cron Each execution of an isolated or custom-session cron job
CLI operations cli Background CLI commands that run through the gateway

What does not create tasks:

  • Heartbeat turns — main-session; see Heartbeat
  • Main-session cron (sessionTarget: "main") — see Cron Jobs
  • Normal interactive chat turns
  • Direct /command responses

Task lifecycle

stateDiagram-v2
    [*] --> queued
    queued --> running : agent starts
    running --> succeeded : completes ok
    running --> failed : error
    running --> timed_out : timeout exceeded
    running --> cancelled : operator cancels
    queued --> lost : session gone > 5 min
    running --> lost : session gone > 5 min
Status What it means
queued Created, waiting for the agent to start
running Agent turn is actively executing
succeeded Completed successfully
failed Completed with an error
timed_out Exceeded the configured timeout
cancelled Stopped by the operator via openclaw tasks cancel
lost Backing child session disappeared (detected after a 5-minute grace period)

Transitions happen automatically — when the associated agent run ends, the task status updates to match.

Delivery and notifications

When a task reaches a terminal state, OpenClaw notifies you. There are two delivery paths:

Direct delivery — if the task has a channel target (the requesterOrigin), the completion message goes straight to that channel (Telegram, Discord, Slack, etc.).

Session-queued delivery — if direct delivery fails or no origin is set, the update is queued as a system event in the requester's session and surfaces on the next heartbeat.

Task completion triggers an immediate heartbeat wake so you see the result quickly — you do not have to wait for the next scheduled heartbeat tick.

Notification policies

Control how much you hear about each task:

Policy What is delivered
done_only (default) Only terminal state (succeeded, failed, etc.) — this is the default
state_changes Every state transition and progress update
silent Nothing at all

Change the policy while a task is running:

openclaw tasks notify <lookup> state_changes

CLI reference

tasks list

openclaw tasks list [--runtime <acp|subagent|cron|cli>] [--status <status>] [--json]

Output columns: Task ID, Kind, Status, Delivery, Run ID, Child Session, Summary.

tasks show

openclaw tasks show <lookup>

The lookup token accepts a task ID, run ID, or session key. Shows the full record including timing, delivery state, error, and terminal summary.

tasks cancel

openclaw tasks cancel <lookup>

For ACP and subagent tasks, this kills the child session. Status transitions to cancelled and a delivery notification is sent.

tasks notify

openclaw tasks notify <lookup> <done_only|state_changes|silent>

tasks audit

openclaw tasks audit [--json]

Surfaces operational issues. Findings also appear in openclaw status when issues are detected.

Finding Severity Trigger
stale_queued warn Queued for more than 10 minutes
stale_running error Running for more than 30 minutes
lost error Backing session is gone
delivery_failed warn Delivery failed and notify policy is not silent
missing_cleanup warn Terminal task with no cleanup timestamp
inconsistent_timestamps warn Timeline violation (for example ended before started)

Status integration (task pressure)

openclaw status includes an at-a-glance task summary:

Tasks: 3 queued · 2 running · 1 issues

The summary reports:

  • active — count of queued + running
  • failures — count of failed + timed_out + lost
  • byRuntime — breakdown by acp, subagent, cron, cli

Storage and maintenance

Where tasks live

Task records persist in SQLite at:

$OPENCLAW_STATE_DIR/tasks/runs.sqlite

The registry loads into memory at gateway start and syncs writes to SQLite for durability across restarts.

Automatic maintenance

A sweeper runs every 60 seconds and handles three things:

  1. Reconciliation — checks if active tasks' backing sessions still exist. If a child session has been gone for more than 5 minutes, the task is marked lost.
  2. Cleanup stamping — sets a cleanupAfter timestamp on terminal tasks (endedAt + 7 days).
  3. Pruning — deletes records past their cleanupAfter date.

Retention: terminal task records are kept for 7 days, then automatically pruned. No configuration needed.

How tasks relate to other systems

Tasks and cron

A cron job definition lives in ~/.openclaw/cron/jobs.json. Each execution of an isolated cron job creates a task record. Main-session cron jobs do not.

See Cron Jobs.

Tasks and heartbeat

Heartbeat runs are main-session turns — they do not create task records. When a task completes, it can trigger a heartbeat wake so you see the result promptly.

See Heartbeat.

Tasks and sessions

A task may reference a childSessionKey (where work runs) and a requesterSessionKey (who started it). Sessions are conversation context; tasks are activity tracking on top of that.

Tasks and agent runs

A task's runId links to the agent run doing the work. Agent lifecycle events (start, end, error) automatically update the task status — you do not need to manage the lifecycle manually.

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