Untether

Name: Untether
Author: Little Bear Apps

Code from anywhere

Telegram bridge for AI coding agents.

Send tasks by voice or text, watch your agent work in real time, and approve changes — all from your phone. Works with Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode, and Pi.

Releasedv0.24.0

Get Started View on GitHub

What it does

Control AI coding agents from anywhere with a phone signal

Remote task dispatch

Send tasks from Telegram by text or voice note — the agent starts working immediately.

Ship a feature fix from the couch

Live progress streaming

Watch your agent's output in real time — every tool call, every file change, streamed to your phone.

Voice-dictate a task during a walk

Inline permission approval

Approve or deny file writes, shell commands, and other tool calls with a single tap.

Approve the next step with one tap on a train

Project and branch management

Run four agents on four projects without opening a terminal

What Untether includes

Progress streaming
Watch your agent work in real time — tool calls, file changes, model/mode metadata, and elapsed time streamed to Telegram.
Interactive permissions
Approve or deny tool calls with inline Telegram buttons. Progressive cooldown after 'Pause & Outline Plan'.
Session modes
Assistant (ongoing chat), workspace (forum topics per project), or handoff mode. Toggle plan mode per chat with auto/manual approval.
Projects and worktrees
Register repos with untether init, target branches, and run multiple agents in isolated worktrees in parallel.
Cost and usage tracking
Per-run and daily budgets, subscription usage in the footer, /usage for detailed breakdowns, optional auto-cancel.
Voice notes
Dictate tasks instead of typing — transcribes via a configurable Whisper-compatible endpoint.
File management
Upload files to your repo, download results back to Telegram, and browse project files with inline buttons.
Scheduled tasks
Queue work for later with cron expressions and webhook triggers.
Forum topics
Map Telegram forum topics to projects and branches — one thread per task.
Plugin system
Extend Untether with custom engines, transports, and commands.

How it works

Messages go from Telegram to your agent and back. I'm not in the middle.

Telegram to agent

Live progress

Permission gates

Multi-project

What exactly does it access?

What it accesses

Your Telegram messages sent to the bot
AI agent stdout/stderr for progress streaming

Where it stores

Config: ~/.untether/untether.toml
Session state: in-memory (no database)

Delete ~/.untether/ to remove all config

Network calls

Telegram Bot API (api.telegram.org)
No Little Bear Apps servers involved

Stop the service to disable

Set up with any AI agent

Copy this prompt — your AI agent handles the rest

Works with:

Claude Code

Codex CLI

OpenCode

I want to install Untether (https://github.com/littlebearapps/untether) to control AI coding agents from Telegram. Please guide me step-by-step, including creating the Telegram bot.

Manual configuration per agent

Anthropic

OpenAI

Multi-provider

~/.untether/untether.toml

[agent]
name = "claude-code"
command = "claude"
args = ["--dangerously-skip-permissions"]

[telegram]
bot_token = "your-bot-token"
allowed_users = [your-telegram-id]

[session]
mode = "chat"

Start with: untether start. Then send a message to your bot on Telegram.

~/.untether/untether.toml

[agent]
name = "codex"
command = "codex"
args = ["--auto-edit"]

[telegram]
bot_token = "your-bot-token"
allowed_users = [your-telegram-id]

[session]
mode = "chat"

Requires Codex CLI installed. Start with: untether start. Voice notes are transcribed automatically.

~/.untether/untether.toml

[agent]
name = "opencode"
command = "opencode"
args = []

[telegram]
bot_token = "your-bot-token"
allowed_users = [your-telegram-id]

[session]
mode = "chat"

Configure your provider in OpenCode first, then start with: untether start.

~/.untether/untether.toml

[agent]
name = "pi"
command = "pi"
args = []

[telegram]
bot_token = "your-bot-token"
allowed_users = [your-telegram-id]

[session]
mode = "chat"

Configure your provider in Pi first, then start with: untether start.

Ready to go? Try these commands

Send these to your bot on Telegram

"/claude fix the broken test in src/utils/parser.ts"

Dispatches a task to Claude Code

"/new"

Starts a fresh session with clean context

"/cancel"

Stops the currently running agent

"I was walking Normi and had an idea for a fix. By the time I got home and opened my laptop, I'd forgotten half of it."

—

Nathan Founder

Where to find Untether

IssuesReport bugs

DocumentationGuides & API reference

SecuritySecurity policy

PyPIPython package

View on GitHub

Questions about Untether

What is Untether?

Untether is a Telegram bridge that connects AI coding agents to your phone. Send tasks by text or voice, watch progress in real time, and approve changes with inline buttons. It works with Claude Code, Codex CLI, OpenCode, and Pi.

Does Untether send my code to Little Bear Apps?

No. All communication flows between Telegram and the agent running on your machine. Little Bear Apps never sees your code, messages, or agent output.

Do I need a Telegram account?

Yes. You need a Telegram account and a bot token from @BotFather. The bot runs on your machine and only responds to your Telegram user ID.

Can I use voice notes?

Yes. Untether transcribes voice notes via a configurable Whisper-compatible endpoint, and the transcription is sent to your agent as a text message.

Does it work with other AI coding agents?

Yes. Untether supports Claude Code, Codex CLI, OpenCode, and Pi out of the box. The plugin system allows adding custom agent integrations.

Can I control multiple projects at once?

Yes. Register multiple repos with untether init and switch between them from Telegram using project-specific commands or forum topics.

Is there a cost for using Untether?

Untether itself is free and open source (MIT licence). You pay for your AI agent's API usage as normal. The Telegram Bot API is free.

How do I restrict access to my bot?

Set allowed_users in untether.toml to your Telegram user ID. The bot ignores messages from anyone else.

What changes

• Instead of opening your laptop to start a coding task, send a voice note or text message from Telegram.
• Instead of watching a terminal for progress, get live updates streamed to your phone with approval buttons.
• Instead of managing one agent at a time, route tasks to multiple projects from a single Telegram chat.
• Instead of losing context between sessions, resume right where you left off with persistent session history.