---
title: "Channels"
description: "Set workspace defaults, choose agent templates, and preview channel experiences."
source: https://hiy.ai/docs/channels
---

## Channels

**Channels** is the workspace-level place to decide where your agents answer and what each experience feels like. Open it from the main sidebar and choose Chat widget, Embedded chat bar, or Hosted page.

The first live channels are:

- **Chat widget** — a floating chat experience on your site.
- **Embedded chat bar** — a compact agent input fixed at the bottom of your site.
- **Hosted page** — the existing hiy.ai page for a personal twin.

The hosted page is not a second editor: open it from Channels when a personal
twin is available. Publishing its template sets the greeting and starting
points on the agent's hiy.ai page — the same template the preview shows. Until
you publish one, that page keeps the greeting and questions from the agent's
own [first impression](/docs/first-impression), which is also what an agent
with no hosted-page template shows. Product API, colleague access, and other
destinations can be added later without making the first setup screen harder to
understand.

### Templates and agents

Each channel has a **workspace default**. It is the fallback used by agents that do not have a channel-specific choice. Templates are reusable: choose an existing one for an agent, or create a private copy with **Customize for this agent**.

You can also open Channels from an agent's **Overview**. That keeps the agent selected, so changing its channel template takes one step. Resetting an agent returns it to the workspace default.

### Bar behaviour and position

The **Embedded chat bar** has two settings of its own, under **Appearance**.

**Behaviour** decides how the bar rests on your site. **Always visible** keeps
the input on screen on every page, so a visitor can ask without looking for
anything first. **From a button** rests as a small pill carrying your agent's
name, and grows into the full bar when someone taps it — the quieter choice on
a page where the bar would otherwise take a fixed share of a phone screen.

**Position** pins the bar **Left**, **Centre** or **Right** across the foot of
the page. A pill set to **From a button** expands from wherever it is pinned:
left grows rightward, right grows leftward.

Both are per-template, so one agent can use an always-visible bar while another
uses a button. Existing templates keep working unchanged — anything saved before
these settings existed reads as **Always visible** and **Centre** until you
change it. They do not apply to the Chat widget, which has its own corner.

### Edit, preview, publish

The preview updates as you edit. **Save draft** keeps changes private; **Publish** saves and publishes the displayed configuration together. New visitor embed sessions read the published version, never an unsaved draft. Existing open visitor conversations are not reloaded.

Use **Preview as** to try another agent without changing the template being edited. Desktop and phone controls change the preview size. Publishing actions sit beside the page title. Channel selectors and preview controls share the row above the divider. Settings and the right-hand preview start together below it. The preview shows your widget with the chrome a visitor gets — the chat widget's launcher and card, or the chat bar's two cards — drawn by the same components as the full-page preview, so what you edit here is what they meet.

**Open full preview in new tab** gives the same widget a whole page, with backdrop, theme and device controls, your current appearance edits and a separate test conversation. Your original conversation stays open. The appearance snapshot lasts 30 minutes in this browser; it does not publish changes or synchronise later edits. **Restart conversation** starts a new test. On a phone, switch between **Edit** and **Preview** without losing changes. Drafts survive channel and template switches until you leave the editor; save before leaving.

**Template options** contains duplicate, rename, and workspace-default controls. **Agent template** selects an existing published template or returns an agent to the workspace default. Customising creates a separate copy; publish that copy when ready. The editor shows how many agents use the template you are changing.

**Install** opens a selectable code snippet and instructions. Restricted support agents require a visitor token minted on your server; never put the signing secret in website code. Installing uses the agent's assigned published template, not whichever draft you happen to be previewing.

Channels preview tests visitor presentation safely. Use the agent's **Sandbox** to investigate answer quality and source behaviour.

If an agent has its own template, edits to that copy affect only its users. Editing a shared template affects every agent using it when you publish; selecting a preview agent never changes this scope.

The channel editor is the home for channel-specific installation and preview actions. Messaging apps such as Slack and WhatsApp are not live channels yet; the public [Channels overview](/channels) explains what is available today.