openclaw/docs/tools/show-widget.md

summary, title, sidebarTitle, read_when

summary	title	sidebarTitle	read_when
Show self-contained HTML widgets on supported chat surfaces	Show widget	Show widget	You want an agent to render an interactive result in web chat, a native app, or Discord You want widget buttons to send follow-up prompts into the chat You want to theme widgets with the shared design tokens You need the show_widget input, security, or retention contract

show_widget is a core tool that shows a self-contained HTML widget on the user's current surface. OpenClaw renders it inline in the Control UI, iOS, Android, and macOS chat transcripts; Linux uses the browser Control UI. In a Discord session with Activities enabled, the Discord plugin posts an Open widget button that launches it as an Activity.

How widgets work

When the agent calls show_widget, OpenClaw core wraps widget_code in a minimal HTML document, stores it as a Canvas document, and returns a preview handle. The Control UI renders that handle as a sandboxed iframe directly under the tool call, while native apps use an isolated web view. Both restore the widget after history reload.

In Control UI sessions, a Canvas widget can also be pinned to the session dashboard. Set pin: true in the tool call, or use Pin to dashboard on an existing transcript widget. Pinning reuses the exact hosted document; it does not fetch widget HTML through the browser.

For browser embedding, the wrapper document injects four small host bridges around the widget code:

• A size reporter posts the rendered content height to the embedding chat, which clamps it and fits the iframe (160 to 1200 pixels).
• A prompt bridge defines a global sendPrompt(text) function that widget scripts can call to submit a follow-up message into the chat. The bridge creates a private message channel and offers one endpoint to the chat before any widget code runs; the chat adopts only that first offer. See Interactive widgets.
• A theme bridge listens for the Control UI's current design tokens and applies them as CSS variables, on load and again on every theme change.
• A snapshot bridge renders the current widget document as a PNG when the embedding chat requests an export.

Everything else stays inside the frame: the document runs in an opaque origin with a strict Content Security Policy, so widget scripts cannot reach the Control UI, the Gateway, or the network.

The core implementation is available only when the originating Gateway client declares the inline-widgets capability. The Control UI and supported native apps declare this capability automatically. The Discord implementation is available only in Discord sessions with Activities configured. Other channel runs do not receive show_widget.

Capability transport covers embedded, Codex app-server, and CLI-backed model backends. Grant-authenticated MCP callers and direct HTTP tool-invoke callers remain fail closed because they do not declare client capabilities.

Design system

Every Canvas widget includes a classless base stylesheet and a small token set:

Token	Purpose
--surface	Page-level surface color
--card	Card, button, and code background
--elevated	Elevated form-control background
--text	Default body and control text
--text-strong	Headings and prominent values
--muted	Secondary text and subtle borders
--border	Standard separators and card borders
--border-strong	Strong control borders
--accent	Links and focus rings
--accent-fill	Primary action fill
--accent-fg	Text on a primary action
--ok	Success state
--warn	Warning state
--danger	Error or destructive state
--info	Informational state
--radius	Shared control and card corner radius
--font-body	Host body font stack
--font-mono	Host monospace font stack
--accent-subtle, --ok-subtle, --warn-subtle, --danger-subtle, --info-subtle	Derived translucent state backgrounds

Bare headings, paragraphs, links, buttons, inputs, selects, textareas, tables, and code blocks receive base styles. Helper classes provide common patterns:

• .card for a bordered content surface
• .badge, plus .ok, .warn, .danger, or .info, for compact status labels
• .metric for a prominent numeric value
• .muted for secondary text
• .row for a wrapping horizontal layout
• button.primary for the primary action

The Control UI posts an openclaw:widget-theme message with the active theme values when a widget loads and whenever the theme changes. Widgets therefore track every theme family, including Claw, Knot, Dash, and custom themes, without reloading. Outside the Control UI, including native apps and direct opens, widgets use the baked light or dark palette selected by prefers-color-scheme.

Author widgets with three rules:

1. Use the design variables for every color and background. Do not hardcode color values.
2. Keep the page background transparent so the widget belongs to its host surface.
3. Reserve --accent-fill for at most one primary action.

Export: In web chat, open the widget card menu to copy the rendered widget to the clipboard or download it as a PNG. Older widget documents without the snapshot bridge fall back to an HTML file download.

Use the tool

Both implementations use the same required fields:

Short title shown with the inline preview and in the hosted document title. Self-contained HTML or SVG. For inline-widget clients, input beginning with `

Discord also accepts optional button_label text for the Activity launch button. The Canvas schema intentionally omits this Discord-only field.

The core Canvas tool accepts these optional dashboard placement fields:

• pin: also place the widget on the session dashboard.
• name: stable widget name; defaults to a slug of title.
• tab: destination tab slug.
• size: one of sm, md, lg, xl, or full.
• after: sibling widget name after which to place the widget.

The core result includes a Canvas preview handle, so the Control UI and supported native apps render the widget directly from the tool call and restore it after history reload. Pinned results also retain the board widget name so the Control UI does not offer a duplicate pin after transcript reload. Discord returns the stored widget and posted-message identifiers.

discord_widget remains registered as a deprecated alias for one release. New agent calls should use show_widget.

Interactive widgets

In the Control UI, widget scripts can drive the conversation. The wrapper document defines a global sendPrompt(text) function; calling it submits text to the chat as if the user had typed and sent the message. Wire it to buttons or other controls to build interactive flows such as pickers, quizzes, or drill-down dashboards. Native apps render interactive widget code but do not expose this chat prompt bridge.

<button onclick="sendPrompt('Show the failing tests in detail')">Failing tests</button>

Every prompt is validated on both sides of the frame boundary:

• sendPrompt requires transient user activation inside the widget: it only works in the few seconds after the user clicks or presses a key in the widget, so wire it to buttons and other click targets — calling it automatically on load does nothing. The bridge keeps the sending endpoint private to itself and fails closed in browsers that do not expose user activation, so widget code cannot bypass the check.
• Prompt authority belongs to the original widget document only. The trusted bridge offers its channel endpoint to the chat before widget code can run or navigate the frame, the chat adopts only that first offer, and the channel dies with the document on navigation. Externally allowed embed URLs are never adopted.
• The widget frame must be visible in the chat transcript and hold focus — an additional host-observed signal that the user is actually interacting with this widget.
• The text must be non-empty after trimming and at most 4,000 characters.
• Prompts starting with / are rejected, so widget code cannot trigger chat commands such as /approve or /stop.
• Each widget document may send at most 10 prompts per rolling minute; excess prompts are dropped silently.

Accepted prompts appear in the transcript as regular user messages and start a normal agent turn in the session that owns the widget. There is no feedback channel into the widget: a dropped prompt fails silently, and the widget cannot read the agent's reply.

Security and storage

Widget documents use restrictive Content Security Policies. Inline style and script are allowed, while external fetches and resource loads are blocked. Keep all markup, styles, scripts, and image data inside widget_code.

The Control UI iframe always omits allow-same-origin, even when the global embed mode is trusted, so widget scripts cannot read the parent application origin. Native clients use isolated, nonpersistent web views and block navigation away from the hosted widget. The core document host also serves widgets with a Content-Security-Policy: sandbox allow-scripts response header, so direct rendering still runs the widget in an opaque origin instead of an application origin. Only render widget code you are willing to execute in that isolated frame.

The iframe also follows gateway.controlUi.embedSandbox. The default scripts tier supports interactive widgets while preserving origin isolation.

Canvas retains at most 32 widgets per session (or per agent when no session is available). Creating another widget removes the oldest document in that scope.

Related

• Control UI hosted embeds
• Discord Activities
• Canvas node controls
• Gateway protocol client capabilities