Environment

Summary

After upgrading from 2026.3.11 to 2026.3.22, the WhatsApp channel is completely unavailable. The gateway logs:

plugins.entries.whatsapp: plugin not found: whatsapp (stale config entry ignored; remove it from plugins config)

openclaw channels add --channel whatsapp returns Unknown channel: whatsapp, despite --help still listing WhatsApp as a valid channel.

Root Cause Analysis

The WhatsApp extension entry point was not compiled into dist/extensions/ during the 3.22 build:

• dist/extensions/whatsapp/ — does not exist (compare: dist/extensions/telegram/ has index.js, openclaw.plugin.json, package.json, setup-entry.js)
• dist/plugin-sdk/extensions/whatsapp/ — exists but only contains .d.ts type definitions, no index.js
• dist/whatsapp-core-BxmLm1zq.js and dist/whatsapp-DiZX3r_W.js — runtime chunks do exist in the main dist, just no entry point to load them
• @whiskeysockets/baileys — not present in node_modules of the installed package

The WhatsApp runtime code was compiled into the main bundle but the extension entry point (index.js, openclaw.plugin.json, package.json) was never generated in dist/extensions/.

Likely Related

This appears connected to the 3.22 changelog entry:

Gateway/startup: load bundled channel plugins from compiled dist/extensions entries in built installs, so gateway boot no longer recompiles bundled extension TypeScript on every startup and WhatsApp-class cold starts drop back to seconds instead of tens of seconds or worse.

The move from on-the-fly TypeScript compilation to pre-compiled extensions likely dropped WhatsApp silently during the build (possibly due to Baileys native dependency issues), and with no startup recompilation fallback, the channel is completely missing.

Similar Past Issues

• [Bug]: WhatsApp channel fails to start in 2026.2.14 - missing module #17359 — WhatsApp fails in 2026.2.14 with Cannot find module 'dist/web-DZaTo4-o.js'
• [Bug]: Control UI assets not found. Build them with pnpm ui:build (auto-installs UI deps), or run pnpm ui:dev during development. #52880 — Feishu plugin load errors in 3.22
• [Bug]: WeChat QR code scan shows blank/white screen (QCLAW_USER_GUID and QCLAW_USER_ID not injected) #52914 — Matrix plugin API version mismatch in 3.22

Steps to Reproduce

1. npm i -g openclaw@2026.3.22
2. Configure channels.whatsapp in openclaw.json (or have existing config from 3.11)
3. Start gateway: systemctl restart openclaw
4. Observe: plugin not found: whatsapp
5. Try: openclaw channels add --channel whatsapp → Unknown channel: whatsapp
6. Verify: ls dist/extensions/ — no whatsapp/ directory

Expected Behavior

WhatsApp channel loads and connects as it did in 2026.3.11.

Workaround

Downgrade to 2026.3.11:

npm i -g openclaw@2026.3.11
systemctl restart openclaw

WhatsApp connects immediately on 3.11.