openclaw - 💡(How to fix) Fix [Bug] webchat 2026.5.18: phantom 'In progress' state after turn completes — UI not syncing idle on turn completion [1 comments, 2 participants]

Summary

In 2026.5.18, the webchat UI shows a persistent "In progress" state (animated ••• typing indicator + red Stop button + "In progress" toolbar badge) after a turn completes and the agent is fully idle. The agent confirms it has no active processes, subagents, or queued work — the state is phantom.

Build

OpenClaw 2026.5.18 (50a2481)

Reproduction

1. Send a message to the agent in webchat
2. Agent replies and completes the turn (no tool calls pending, no subagents running)
3. The ••• typing indicator reappears beneath the last reply bubble
4. The toolbar shows "In progress" badge and red Stop button
5. /stop prompt is not accepted / does not clear the state

Additional context

• Occurs reproducibly in this session — happened at least twice (15:10 PDT and 15:29 PDT)
• Hard refresh (Cmd+Shift+R) clears the phantom state each time
• Agent-side confirms idle: process list = no sessions, subagents list = 0 active
• The "In progress" UX indicator is a new addition in this build — the phantom state appears tied to it
• Prior builds did not show this behavior
• Each time the user reports it, the agent can immediately confirm idle state, suggesting the WebSocket session state is correct but the UI render layer is not syncing on turn completion

Impact

Accurate idle state visibility matters for operator trust and workflow — if the UI shows "in progress" the operator doesn't know whether to wait or send a new message. The Stop button going red also creates unnecessary friction.

Suggested investigation

• Check whether the new "In progress" indicator subscribes to a different session-state event than the previous turn-completion signal
• Verify WebSocket turn_complete / session_idle events are firing and being consumed by the UI state machine on all turn types (including short/fast replies)