MetaClaw: Just Talk -- An Agent That Meta-Learns and Evolves in the Wild
On the map: LLM agents and tool use → Agent skill learning and evolution
Abstract (arXiv)
Large language model (LLM) agents are increasingly used for complex tasks, yet deployed agents often remain static, failing to adapt as user needs evolve. This creates a tension between the need for continuous service and the necessity of updating capabilities to match shifting task distributions. On platforms like OpenClaw, which handle diverse workloads across 20+ channels, existing methods either store raw trajectories without distilling knowledge, maintain static skill libraries, or require disruptive downtime for retraining. We present MetaClaw, a continual meta-learning framework that jointly evolves a base LLM policy and a library of reusable behavioral skills. MetaClaw employs two complementary mechanisms. Skill-driven fast adaptation analyzes failure trajectories via an LLM evolver to synthesize new skills, enabling immediate improvement with zero downtime. Opportunistic policy optimization performs gradient-based updates via cloud LoRA fine-tuning and Reinforcement Learning with a Process Reward Model (RL-PRM). This is triggered during user-inactive windows by the Opportunistic Meta-Learning Scheduler (OMLS), which monitors system inactivity and calendar data. These mechanisms are mutually reinforcing: a refined policy generates better trajectories for skill synthesis, while richer skills provide higher-quality data for policy optimization. To prevent data contamination, a versioning mechanism separates support and query data. Built on a proxy-based architecture, MetaClaw scales to production-size LLMs without local GPUs. Experiments on MetaClaw-Bench and AutoResearchClaw show that skill-driven adaptation improves accuracy by up to 32% relative. The full pipeline advances Kimi-K2.5 accuracy from 21.4% to 40.6% and increases composite robustness by 18.3%. Code is available at https://github.com/aiming-lab/MetaClaw.
Key facts. Cited by 35 papers in the map (data through 7 Oct 2026). Placed in Agent skill learning and evolution, one of 16 directions in LLM agents and tool use. Builds on 44 of its 51 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 17 Mar 2026.
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- 2016RL2: Fast Reinforcement Learning via Slow Reinforcement Learningcited by 490
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- 2018Deep Online Learning via Meta-Learning: Continual Adaptation for Model-Based RLcited by 80
- 2019Continuous Meta-Learning without Taskscited by 50
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- 2021Meta-learning with an Adaptive Task Schedulercited by 27
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Citing papers per year: 2026: 35.
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- 2026Trace2Skill: Distill Trajectory-Local Lessons into Transferable Agent Skillscited by 161
- 2026SkillClaw: Let Skills Evolve Collectively with Agentic Evolvercited by 76
- 2026SkillRet: A Large-Scale Benchmark for Skill Retrieval in LLM Agentscited by 37
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- 2026A Self-Evolving Framework for Efficient Terminal Agents via Observational Context Compressioncited by 12
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- 2026VideoWeaver: Evaluating and Evolving Skills for Agentic Long Video Generationcited by 5
- 2026When Self-Evolution Backfires: Pre-Commit Gating against Skill Contamination in LLM Agentscited by 5
- 2026SkillMAS: Skill Co-Evolution with LLM-based Multi-Agent Systemcited by 3
- 2026RRSI: Regularized Recursive Self-Improvement of Agent Harnessescited by 3
- 2026Ace-Skill: Bootstrapping Multimodal Agents with Prioritized and Clustered Evolutioncited by 2
- 2026Agent-ValueBench: A Comprehensive Benchmark for Evaluating Agent Valuescited by 2
- 2026VisualClaw: A Real-Time, Personalized Agent for the Physical Worldcited by 2
- 2026UniClawBench: A Universal Benchmark for Proactive Agents on Real-World Taskscited by 2
- 2026SkillReason: Reasoning-Enhanced Agent Skill Retrieval for Implicit User Requestscited by 2
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- 2026JAVEDIT: Joint Audio-Visual Instruction-Guided Video Editing with Agentic Data Curationcited by 1
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- 2026FRAMES: Guarded and Dual-Objective Skill Evolution for Agents in Policy-Governed Enterprise Workflowscited by 0
- 2026RingMoClaw: An Experience-Inspired Multi-Agent Framework for Self-Evolving Research in Remote Sensingcited by 0
- 2026Analyzing and Mitigating Cost-Inefficient Behaviors in Coding Agentscited by 0
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- 2026SCLATE: a Substrate for Continual-Learning Agent Training and Evaluation26 Sep 2026
- 2026Analyzing and Mitigating Cost-Inefficient Behaviors in Coding Agents25 Sep 2026
- 2026RRSI: Regularized Recursive Self-Improvement of Agent Harnesses21 Sep 2026
- 2026RingMoClaw: An Experience-Inspired Multi-Agent Framework for Self-Evolving Research in Remote Sensing1 Sep 2026
- 2026WikiSkill: Compiling Agent Experience into Persistent Knowledge for Skill Evolution27 Aug 2026
- 2026EnvHarness: Awakening Static Worlds for Agent Learning20 Aug 2026
- 2026Chain-of-Experience for Continual LLM Improvement18 Aug 2026
- 2026SkillReason: Reasoning-Enhanced Agent Skill Retrieval for Implicit User Requests9 Aug 2026
- 2026When Self-Evolution Backfires: Pre-Commit Gating against Skill Contamination in LLM Agents6 Aug 2026
- 2026FRAMES: Guarded and Dual-Objective Skill Evolution for Agents in Policy-Governed Enterprise Workflows3 Aug 2026
- 2026Do Agent Optimizers Compound? A Continual-Learning Evaluation on Terminal-Bench 2.015 Jul 2026
- 2026Dynamic Agent Skills: A Lifecycle Survey and Taxonomy of Evolving Skill Libraries11 Jul 2026
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- 2026VisualClaw: A Real-Time, Personalized Agent for the Physical World15 Jun 2026
- 2026Agentic Environment Engineering for Large Language Models: A Survey of Environment Modeling, Synthesis, Evaluation, and Application10 Jun 2026
- 2026VideoWeaver: Evaluating and Evolving Skills for Agentic Long Video Generation6 Jun 2026
- 2026SubtleMemory: A Benchmark for Fine-Grained Relational Memory Discrimination in Long-Horizon AI Agents4 Jun 2026
- 2026JAVEDIT: Joint Audio-Visual Instruction-Guided Video Editing with Agentic Data Curation2 Jun 2026
- 2026Skill0.5: Joint Skill Internalization and Utilization for Out-of-Distribution Generalization in Agentic Reinforcement Learning27 May 2026
- 2026SkillsVote: Lifecycle Governance of Agent Skills from Collection, Recommendation to Evolution18 May 2026
- 2026Orchard: An Open-Source Agentic Modeling Framework14 May 2026
- 2026Agent-ValueBench: A Comprehensive Benchmark for Evaluating Agent Values11 May 2026
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- 2026Ace-Skill: Bootstrapping Multimodal Agents with Prioritized and Clustered Evolution9 May 2026
- 2026SkillRet: A Large-Scale Benchmark for Skill Retrieval in LLM Agents7 May 2026
- 2026Synthetic Computers at Scale for Long-Horizon Productivity Simulation30 Apr 2026
- 2026Rethinking Agentic Reinforcement Learning In Large Language Models30 Apr 2026
- 2026ClawGym: A Scalable Framework for Building Effective Claw Agents29 Apr 2026
- 2026A Self-Evolving Framework for Efficient Terminal Agents via Observational Context Compression21 Apr 2026
- 2026ClawEnvKit: Automatic Environment Generation for Claw-Like Agents20 Apr 2026
- 2026FlowEvo: Self-Evolving Agents through the Co-Evolution of Workflows and Executable Skills18 Apr 2026
- 2026OpenClaw and Ollama in Agentic AI: Toward Fully Autonomous and Scalable AI Agent Systems16 Apr 2026
- 2026SkillClaw: Let Skills Evolve Collectively with Agentic Evolver9 Apr 2026
- 2026ClawArena: Benchmarking AI Agents in Evolving Information Environments5 Apr 2026
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- 2026Skill0.5: Joint Skill Internalization and Utilization for Out-of-Distribution Generalization in Agentic Reinforcement Learning27 May 2026
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- 2026JAVEDIT: Joint Audio-Visual Instruction-Guided Video Editing with Agentic Data Curationcited by 1
- 2026SubtleMemory: A Benchmark for Fine-Grained Relational Memory Discrimination in Long-Horizon AI Agentscited by 1
- 2026Chain-of-Experience for Continual LLM Improvementcited by 1
- 2026RingMoClaw: An Experience-Inspired Multi-Agent Framework for Self-Evolving Research in Remote Sensingcited by 0
- 2026SCLATE: a Substrate for Continual-Learning Agent Training and Evaluationcited by 0
- 2026SCLATE: a Substrate for Continual-Learning Agent Training and Evaluation26 Sep 2026
- 2026RingMoClaw: An Experience-Inspired Multi-Agent Framework for Self-Evolving Research in Remote Sensing1 Sep 2026
- 2026WikiSkill: Compiling Agent Experience into Persistent Knowledge for Skill Evolution27 Aug 2026
- 2026Chain-of-Experience for Continual LLM Improvement18 Aug 2026
- 2026Do Agent Optimizers Compound? A Continual-Learning Evaluation on Terminal-Bench 2.015 Jul 2026
- 2026SubtleMemory: A Benchmark for Fine-Grained Relational Memory Discrimination in Long-Horizon AI Agents4 Jun 2026
- 2026JAVEDIT: Joint Audio-Visual Instruction-Guided Video Editing with Agentic Data Curation2 Jun 2026
- 2026Ace-Skill: Bootstrapping Multimodal Agents with Prioritized and Clustered Evolution9 May 2026
- 2026Synthetic Computers at Scale for Long-Horizon Productivity Simulation30 Apr 2026
- 2026ClawEnvKit: Automatic Environment Generation for Claw-Like Agents20 Apr 2026
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