How to Deploy a Claude Code Agent to Slack (Always-On, Team-Wide)
Deploy a locally-built Claude Code agent to Slack with Runbear so it runs always-on for your team: its own bot, per-user permissions, no laptop required.
TL;DR: Install the Runbear plugin in Claude Code, run /runbear:deploy, then /runbear:connect-slack. Your local agent becomes an always-on Slack bot your whole team can use, no laptop required.
You can build a genuinely useful AI agent in Claude in an afternoon. Then you close your laptop, and it stops.
The fix is to deploy it: send your agent to Slack so it runs on its own, always-on, where your whole team can reach it without you in the loop.
| Dimension | On your laptop | Deployed to Slack |
| Availability | Runs only while your machine is awake | Always-on, 24/7 |
| Who can use it | Just you | Your whole team, in Slack |
| Identity | A local project | Its own Slack bot, with a name and icon |
| Permissions | Your access only | Each teammate authenticates as themselves |
| Your involvement | You run it for people | People use it directly, without you |
Here is how to do it.
How to deploy a Claude agent to Slack
You already have an agent running locally: a project with a CLAUDE.md, whatever skills it needs, and its integrations. Here is how to deploy it.
Prerequisites
- Claude Code installed, with the Runbear MCP connected (the deploy sets this up on first run).
- An existing local agent: a project folder with a CLAUDE.md, and optionally skills and MCP integrations.
Set it up once. Runbear's deploy tools ship as a Claude Code plugin (see the Agent Skills docs). Add the marketplace and install it one time:
/plugin marketplace add runbear-io/skills
/plugin install runbear@runbear-skillsThat gives you two commands: /runbear:deploy to deploy a project, and /runbear:connect-slack to give it a Slack bot. (The plugin lives in the runbear-io/skills repo.)
1. Run the deploy
From your project, run:
/runbear:deploy --new "My Agent"It packs your project and uploads it to a hosted agent (point it at an existing one by name instead of --new). Your files upload directly and securely, and secrets, .env files, and credentials are filtered out automatically, so they never leave your machine.
The deploy walks you through the rest right in Claude Code: it creates the agent, asks which integrations and skills to bring, packs the project, and offers to connect Slack.
2. Choose the integrations to bring
The deploy shows you the tools from your local setup (your MCP integrations) and asks which the hosted agent should carry. For each, you pick how your team authenticates:
- Per-user - each colleague signs in as themselves, so the agent respects their individual permissions (their Notion, their CRM access).
- Shared - everyone uses one org credential, for tools that have a single company account.
3. Pick the skills it ships with
Select which of your skills travel with the agent, so the hosted version behaves exactly like your local one.
4. Connect it to Slack
The deploy offers to do this at the end, or run it any time:
/runbear:connect-slack "My Agent"Runbear gives your agent its own Slack bot, with its own name and icon, installed in your workspace. Now anyone can mention it in a channel or send it a direct message.
That is it. The agent you built on your laptop is now a shared teammate that runs 24/7, with no laptop required.
Why deploy a Claude agent instead of running it locally?
Deploying an agent is not just copying it to a server. It is the moment your private tool becomes something your whole team relies on. Three things change: it goes always-on, it gets its own identity in Slack, and, when it touches real tools, it respects who is asking.
We think the future of agents at work is not one giant assistant that does everything. It is dozens of small, purpose-built agents, each built by the person who understands the problem best, each deployed to the team that needs it. The person who lives in your support queue should build the support agent. The person who owns onboarding should build the onboarding agent. Claude makes that building step accessible to anyone. Runbear makes the last step, deploying it, just as easy.
This is already happening. At InMobi, the sales ops team built their own agent and deployed it to Slack, so the whole team uses it directly instead of routing every request through the person who built it.
Build is solved. Release is the part we are making easy.
FAQ
Does my computer need to stay on for the agent to run?
No. Once you deploy the agent to Slack with Runbear, it runs on hosted infrastructure, not your laptop. It keeps answering, posting, and reacting around the clock even when your machine is off.
How is this different from Claude's native Slack integration?
Anthropic's Claude in Slack gives everyone the same general assistant. Deploying your own agent ships the project you built: its CLAUDE.md context, your skills, and your integrations, as a purpose-built shared bot with its own name, identity, and per-user permissions.
Are my code or secrets uploaded when I deploy?
Your project files are uploaded so the hosted agent has the same context, but secrets, .env files, and credentials are filtered out automatically before upload and never leave your machine.
Do teammates use their own tool permissions?
Yes. For per-user integrations, each teammate authenticates as themselves, so the shared agent respects each person's own access. Shared integrations use a single org credential instead.
Is it free to deploy a Claude agent to Slack?
Yes, to start. Runbear is freemium: you can deploy your agent to Slack on the free plan and upgrade as your team's usage grows.
Can I deploy the agent to other channels besides Slack?
Runbear is Slack-first today, so Slack is the supported deployment target for this flow. Support for other channels is on the roadmap.
Once deployed: a teammate asks the agent a question in Slack, and it answers with its sources and drafts a reply, always-on.
Build your agent in Claude. Release it to Slack with Runbear.