Email automation for OpenClaw

OpenClaw is everywhere right now.

And one of the most requested use cases is email.

This guide shows you how to send your first email, configure an email inbox, and more for your OpenClaw agent using Resend.

Why OpenClaw needs an email API

OpenClaw is awesome, but the moment you want it to send an automated email, things get complicated fast.

The default approach is Gmail. Connect your Google account via OAuth, grant permissions, and let OpenClaw read and send from your inbox.

It works. But you're giving an AI agent broad access to your entire multi-year-old email account. Every message, every attachment, every draft.

That's a real problem. Security researchers have already shown how a single crafted email can trick an OpenClaw agent into leaking inbox data or deleting messages. Prompt injection through email content is not theoretical. It's happening.

Even if security wasn't a concern, Gmail has practical limits. Rate limits kick in when you try to send at any real volume. OAuth tokens expire and break your automation. And the setup itself takes longer than it should.

There's a simpler path. Instead of connecting a personal inbox, you give your agent a dedicated email API.

No inbox exposure. Just an API key and a verified domain.

That's where Resend comes in.

Setting up Resend

First, create a free account. No credit card is required. The free tier gives you 3,000 emails per month, which is plenty for getting started.

For this part, you will actually need a human in the loop in order to verify your email.

Once you're in, you have two options:

A) Provide the credentials to your OpenClaw agent

We recently disabled bot detection, so your OpenClaw agent can now access the Resend dashboard using a headless browser.

Needless to say, you should do this in a secure way using a password manager like 1Password, which has a built-in skill for OpenClaw.

So you can just say to your OpenClaw agent:

Go to my password manager and log in to Resend.

B) Give an API key to your OpenClaw agent

If you prefer to use an API key, you can create one in the Resend API Keys page.

Once you have the API key, you can set it as an environment variable in your terminal.

export RESEND_API_KEY=re_xxxxxxxxx

Install the Resend Skill and MCP in OpenClaw

Now, we'll turn your agent into an email expert that can make API calls.

Tell your OpenClaw agent to install the Resend Skills:

Install the Resend skills: https://github.com/resend/resend-skills

And also the Resend MCP server:

Install the Resend MCP server: https://github.com/resend/resend-mcp

Send your first email with OpenClaw

Now, we have everything we need to send an email, so you can just say to your OpenClaw agent:

Send me an email using Resend

Then, you can check your inbox to see the email.

Give an email inbox to your OpenClaw

One of the cool things you can do is give an email inbox to your OpenClaw agent.

You can do that by saying to your OpenClaw agent:

Create a new Resend Webhook so we can receive emails

The endpoint URL for your webhook will depend on your setup. For example, if you're running your own server, you can use the address of a public IP. If you have a separate application deployed somewhere else, you can use the URL of your application.

What's next

You now have an OpenClaw agent that can send emails, receive inbound messages, and reply to them in real time.

From here, you can start building on top of this. A few ideas:

• Send a daily briefing email every morning with your calendar, tasks, and news
• Auto-reply to support tickets based on your knowledge base
• Send a welcome email to new users

We're just getting started with AI agent integrations. If you build something cool with OpenClaw and Resend, let me know.