How to Automate Your Morning Briefing with OpenClaw

A morning briefing is one of the most practical automations you can build with OpenClaw. Done right, it surfaces everything you need to start the day — calendar events, unread email summaries, weather, and relevant news — without you opening a single app. This guide walks through the full setup, from cron job configuration to delivery channel.

What Goes in a Good Morning Briefing

Before writing any code or configuration, decide what information actually matters to your morning. Most people find that four categories cover it:

• Today's calendar: what meetings are happening, when, and who is attending
• Priority email: messages that arrived overnight that need a response before noon
• Weather: the day's forecast for your location
• Context: a brief summary of anything relevant to your work — news, deadlines, or reminders

Resist the temptation to make the briefing exhaustive. A morning briefing that takes five minutes to read has failed. The goal is 60–90 seconds of high-density context.

Setting Up the OpenClaw Cron Job

OpenClaw cron jobs trigger agent sessions on a schedule. For a morning briefing, you want the job to run early enough that the message arrives before you start your workday — typically 6:00–7:30 AM in your local timezone.

In your OpenClaw configuration file (openclaw.json), add a cron entry under thecrons key:

{
  "crons": [
    {
      "id": "morning-briefing",
      "schedule": "0 7 * * 1-5",
      "timezone": "America/Los_Angeles",
      "prompt": "Send me a morning briefing. Include: (1) today's calendar events with times and attendees, (2) the top 3-5 unread emails that arrived after 8pm yesterday and need attention today, (3) today's weather forecast for Oakland CA, (4) any reminders due today. Keep it under 200 words. Send to Telegram.",
      "channel": "telegram"
    }
  ]
}

The schedule above runs at 7:00 AM Monday–Friday (cron expression: 0 7 * * 1-5). Adjust the time and timezone for your workflow.

Connecting Calendar and Email Tools

The morning briefing works best when OpenClaw has access to your actual calendar and email. If you use Google Workspace, install the gog skill to give your agent access to Google Calendar and Gmail:

clawhub install gog

After installation, authenticate with gws auth login and confirm the agent can read your calendar by running a quick test in chat: "What do I have on my calendar today?"

For Apple Calendar users, the apple-reminders skill provides access to your reminders list. Calendar integration for Apple Calendar requires macOS and runs via the remindctl CLI.

Weather Integration

OpenClaw includes a built-in weather skill that pulls from wttr.in and Open-Meteo. No API key is required. Reference your location in the cron prompt and the agent will include the forecast automatically:

"today's weather forecast for San Francisco, CA"

If you want a more detailed forecast (hourly, precipitation probability, UV index), install the full weather skill:

clawhub install weather

Customizing the Briefing Format

The most important customization is format. Some people prefer a bulleted list. Others want prose. Define your preference in the prompt:

"Format: start with one sentence on the most time-sensitive item. 
Then a bullet list of the day's events. Then a bullet list of priority emails. 
End with weather in one line. No preamble."

Be explicit about what you do not want. Common exclusions:

• Internal meetings with no required prep — "skip recurring 1:1s unless they have agenda notes"
• Marketing emails — "exclude newsletters, promotions, and automated notifications"
• Non-urgent items — "skip anything that can wait until tomorrow"

Delivery Channels

OpenClaw can deliver the briefing to any connected channel. The most practical options:

• Telegram: fastest delivery, works on mobile, easy to dismiss without opening. Best for most people. Configure in openclaw.json with your Telegram bot token.
• Discord: useful if you already start your day in a Discord workspace. The briefing appears in a private channel or DM.
• iMessage: use the imsg skill for delivery to your iPhone Messages app. Requires the macOS iMessage integration.
• Email: available but not recommended — adds email to the inbox you are already trying to triage.

Troubleshooting Common Issues

The cron runs but no message arrives

Check the OpenClaw logs: openclaw logs --cron morning-briefing. The most common cause is a misconfigured timezone. Verify your timezone string matches the IANA timezone database format (e.g., America/New_York, not EST).

Calendar events are missing or wrong

Run openclaw gws auth status to confirm your Google credentials are still valid. OAuth tokens expire and need periodic re-authentication.

The briefing is too long

Add explicit word count constraints to the prompt: "keep the entire briefing under 150 words." If email summaries dominate, add: "summarize each email in one sentence."

Going Further: Evening Recap

Once your morning briefing is stable, the natural complement is an evening recap. Use the same cron structure but schedule it for 5:30–6:00 PM:

{
  "id": "evening-recap",
  "schedule": "30 17 * * 1-5",
  "timezone": "America/Los_Angeles",
  "prompt": "Send an end-of-day recap: (1) meetings that happened today and any follow-ups needed, (2) emails I haven't responded to that need replies tomorrow, (3) tomorrow's first calendar event as a preview. Under 150 words.",
  "channel": "telegram"
}

The morning/evening pair creates a daily operational loop that surfaces the right context at the right time without requiring manual review of every connected tool.

For more OpenClaw automation patterns, see How to Build Automated Workflows with OpenClaw Cron Jobs and How to Create a New Agent in OpenClaw.