Nous Research has introduced a migration tool that makes it easier for OpenClaw users to move their agents, memory, skills, and configuration into Hermes Agent.
The new hermes claw migrate command reads an existing OpenClaw installation, previews the proposed changes, and imports compatible data into Hermes. It also identifies components that require manual work instead of silently discarding them.
The development is significant because personal AI agents become increasingly difficult to replace as they accumulate instructions, memories, integrations, and custom workflows. A structured migration path reduces that lock-in.
At a Glance
The Hermes migration tool can transfer:
- Agent personality and instructions
- Long-term and daily memory
- User profile information
- Custom skills from four supported locations
- Model and provider settings
- MCP server configurations
- Telegram, Discord, Slack, Signal, Matrix, and other messaging settings
- Text-to-speech configuration
- Execution, sandbox, session, and browser preferences
Secrets and API keys are excluded unless the user explicitly requests their migration.
How the OpenClaw Migration Works
The basic command is:
hermes claw migrateBefore changing anything, Hermes displays a complete preview and asks the user to confirm the migration.
Users who only want to inspect the proposed changes can run:
hermes claw migrate --dry-runA full migration, including supported API keys, can be started with:
hermes claw migrate --preset full --migrate-secrets --yesThe explicit --migrate-secrets flag is an important safeguard. Even the full preset will not automatically copy credentials without it.
By default, Hermes looks for OpenClaw in ~/.openclaw/. It can also detect older Clawdbot and Moltbot installations or accept a custom location through the --source option.
Memory and Personality Can Move With the Agent
An AI agent is more than its model. Its personality, understanding of the user, and accumulated history often represent months of customization.
Hermes can directly copy an OpenClaw SOUL.md file into its own personality configuration. It also imports information from:
MEMORY.mdUSER.md- Daily files inside the
memorydirectory - Workspace-level instructions when a target directory is specified
Memory entries are merged and deduplicated instead of simply overwriting the existing Hermes memory store.
That makes the migration more than a software installation. It is intended to preserve the continuity of the agent itself.
Custom Skills Are Included
Hermes checks four possible locations for OpenClaw-compatible skills:
- Workspace skills
- OpenClaw-managed shared skills
- Personal cross-project skills
- Project-level shared skills
Imported skills are placed in a dedicated openclaw-imports directory.
Users can decide how naming conflicts should be handled. Existing skills can be preserved, overwritten, or accompanied by a renamed imported copy. A new Hermes session must be started before imported skills become available.
Model and Provider Settings Can Be Translated
The migration utility translates OpenClaw model configuration into the corresponding Hermes settings.
This includes:
- Default model selection
- Fallback models
- Custom AI providers
- Provider endpoints
- API formats
- Reasoning effort
- Context compression
- Maximum agent turns
According to the Hermes documentation, users can also connect through Nous Portal, which provides access to more than 300 models and its Tool Gateway through one OAuth login.
API credentials are only transferred when secret migration is enabled.
Messaging Integrations Are Supported
Hermes can migrate configuration for several messaging services, including Telegram, Discord, Slack, WhatsApp, Signal, Matrix, and Mattermost.
Tokens and approved-user lists can be translated into Hermes environment variables where supported.
Not every platform is completely automatic. WhatsApp, for example, requires a new QR-code pairing because its authentication session cannot simply be transferred.
Users should restart the Hermes gateway and test each messaging channel after the migration.
Hermes Creates a Backup Before Making Changes
Before applying the migration, Hermes creates a ZIP backup of the existing ~/.hermes/ directory.
The archive provides a restore point if the imported configuration causes a problem. Users can disable this behavior with --no-backup, but keeping the backup is the safer option.
Hermes will also refuse to proceed when unresolved file conflicts are present unless the user enables overwriting or chooses another conflict strategy.
What Does Not Migrate Automatically?
Some OpenClaw features do not have a direct Hermes equivalent. Instead of ignoring them, the migration tool copies their configuration into a timestamped archive for review.
These items can include:
- Cron jobs
- Plugins
- Webhooks and hooks
- Multi-agent definitions
- Channel bindings
- Heartbeat instructions
- Advanced memory backend settings
- Interface and identity customization
- Complex messaging configurations
Users may need to recreate these features using Hermes profiles, cron commands, plugins, webhooks, or configuration tools.
The command transfers a substantial amount of agent state, but it should not be treated as a perfect clone of a complex OpenClaw deployment.
A Practical Migration Checklist
- Run
hermes claw migrate --dry-run. - Review every detected file and configuration mapping.
- Keep the automatic pre-migration backup enabled.
- Decide whether API keys should be transferred.
- Inspect the archive for unsupported OpenClaw components.
- Start a fresh Hermes session.
- Run
hermes statusto verify model authentication. - Test messaging platforms and tool connections.
- Confirm session-reset and security settings.
- Keep the original OpenClaw directory until Hermes is fully tested.
Hermes provides a cleanup command, but it should only be used after the new installation is working reliably.
The Bigger Picture: AI Agents Need Portability
Agent migration tools could become increasingly important as the personal AI market matures.
Users are no longer choosing only a chatbot or language model. They are building persistent environments containing memory, behavioral rules, tools, credentials, scheduled tasks, and communication channels.
Without portability, moving to another agent platform means rebuilding that environment manually. Hermes is attempting to lower that barrier by translating compatible OpenClaw data while clearly separating the pieces that still need human attention.
The Bottom Line
The Hermes Agent migration tool gives OpenClaw users a practical way to evaluate another agent platform without abandoning all of their existing work.
It preserves many of the most valuable components—including personality, memory, skills, provider settings, and messaging configuration—while using previews, backups, conflict controls, and explicit secret handling to reduce risk.
It is not a completely automatic platform conversion. Complex automations, plugins, webhooks, and channel bindings may still require reconstruction.
As an agent portability tool, hermes claw migrate is a meaningful step toward making personal AI environments easier to move, test, and control.