Available workflow steps
The steps you can place on the canvas — from triggers and agents to approvals and actions.
- Trigger
- Agent
- Knowledge
- Decision
- Tool
- Approval
- Result
Manual trigger
Starts a run from admin, schedule or chat without a dedicated intake service.
Email intake
IMAP or Microsoft 365 Graph mailbox polling becomes a workflow event, with attachments in file-service.
WhatsApp inbound
Meta Business inbound on whatsapp-service starts or continues a graph. It is not OpenClaw.
Teams inbound
A tenant-scoped Teams channel message enters orchestration after OAuth and sender grants.
Webhook intake
HTTP ingress with schema, publish and replay — the contact-form shape used on live tenants.
AI agent
Runs a specialized agent with tenant knowledge, tools and policy as a graph step.
AI judge
Evaluates prior output with a model step before the graph branches or continues.
Switch
Routes on an expression to named branches. The route is drawn, not hidden in a prompt.
Decision
If/else style routing on a decision variable with an otherwise branch.
Knowledge search
Hybrid RAG (vector plus lexical) with a tenant filter before later steps see chunks.
Connector tool
Invokes a governed connector through secret references and tenant policy.
MCP tool
Calls a tool or capability on a tenant MCP server — the same layer AI clients use.
Workflow reference
Executes another versioned workflow by name and maps input/output state.
Workflow call
Calls a workflow in the same project as a nested, observable run.
Workflow action
Generic catalog action selected from node type and operation keys.
Validate fields
Checks required fields on state and can respond when values are missing.
Collect variables
Asks for missing typed values and can loop until the set is complete.
Form / interactive UI
Emits an interactive form, can pause for a reply, then writes values back to state.
Map fields
Copies and transforms object fields with explicit target ← expression mappings.
Set state
Writes paths on run state from literals or $node expressions.
Delay / wait until
Pauses the run for a duration or until a timestamp in a chosen timezone.
For each
Iterates a list in run state with a cap on iterations. The loop is orchestrated, not client-side.
Loop back
Returns to an upstream step until a condition or iteration limit is hit.
Human approval
Pauses orchestration until approval-service records a decision, then resumes.
Notification
Sends e-mail, Teams, WhatsApp or OpenClaw using tenant channels and secret-referenced credentials.
Calendar
Creates, updates or deletes a tenant calendar event. Credentials stay in the vault.
Social publish
Publishes to licensed social surfaces via OpenClaw-related notification paths — not WhatsApp Business.
Email campaign
Launches a named campaign through notification-service, optionally behind approval.
Response
Sends the graph result back on the inbound channel or as an HTTP body.
Fallback response
A dedicated failure or unmatched-path reply, still tenant-scoped.
Service handoff
Transfers the run to another workflow or service with optional wait-for-completion.
Query data
Builds and runs a governed PostgreSQL query against tenant data, not a raw laptop connection.
HTTP request
Sends an explicit http(s) call from the graph. No connection object is required for this node type.
Code
Runs a bounded JavaScript or Python snippet in the workflow sandbox, not on the operator laptop.
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