The most annoying problem in an AI team is not a lack of tools — it is too many of them. Claude Code, Cursor, Copilot, Gemini CLI, OpenCode: each has its own entry point, session, and context. OpenClaw's official ACP Router Skill solves that scheduling layer. You just say "run this in Claude Code" and routing, session management, and thread-style conversations happen automatically.
What it solves: one entry point, no per-tool commands
A unified entry point: funnels requests for Claude Code, Cursor, Copilot, OpenCode, Gemini CLI, Qwen, Kimi and more into one natural-language prompt — no need to remember each CLI's invocation
Automatic mode selection: picks the OpenClaw ACP runtime (default) or direct acpx driving (when needed) per scenario, with thread-style conversation in both
Codex special-casing: explicitly routes Codex chat/control through the native plugin, only using the ACP path when ACP/acpx is explicitly requested — avoiding misrouting
Conversation continuity: supports "continue the previous harness work", keeping external coding-agent sessions in thread-like long conversations
How it works: intent detection + mode selection
The skill centers on two judgment steps. Intent detection triggers when the user says "run this in Claude Code", "continue in Cursor", or "hand this to Gemini" — recognizing a coding-agent request rather than an ordinary subtask. Mode selection defaults to the OpenClaw ACP runtime (via sessions_spawn / ACP tools); it switches to direct acpx driving when the user explicitly asks for acpx, when the ACP runtime is unavailable, or when the job is just relaying a prompt to a harness.
For coding-agent thread requests, the skill requires reading it before creating any thread, so the right tool builds the session — a mandatory preflight that keeps routing quality high.
Typical use cases
Multi-agent parallelism: split one requirement across Claude Code and Gemini CLI, each in its own thread without interference
External harness handoff: the main agent hands coding work to an external coding agent and keeps the "keep going" / "now change this" conversation alive
Team-wide entry: some teammates prefer Cursor, others Claude Code — one natural-language entry point with transparent routing underneath
How to use & download
OpenClaw users: acp-router ships as a built-in plugin-skill — just trigger it in natural language, no extra install. See OpenClaw docs for setup and usage.
Other agent users: follows the standard SKILL.md convention; you can build a similar unified routing layer for coding agents. Source: OpenClaw GitHub repo.
Related resources
Combine with the orchestration set: TaskFlow (taskflow) manages long-running job state, Spike (spike) validates ideas fast, and mcporter wires in MCP servers. To build the tools external agents actually call, see MCP server development (mcp-builder).