Migrating from Direct Tools to Sessions

This guide is for developers who are using Composio's direct tool execution pattern and want to migrate to sessions. For a comparison of the two patterns, see Sessions vs Direct Execution.

With sessions, you don't need to manage tool fetching, authentication, or execution yourself. You create a session and it handles everything. Your existing auth configs and connected accounts carry over, so your users don't need to re-authenticate.

If you're starting fresh, use Configuring Sessions instead.

What changes

	Direct tools	Sessions
Tool discovery	You fetch specific tools by name/toolkit	Agent discovers tools at runtime via meta tools
Authentication	You manage connect links and wait for connections	In-chat auth prompts users automatically, or use `session.authorize()`
Execution	You call `tools.execute()` with version pinning	Agent executes tools through `COMPOSIO_MULTI_EXECUTE_TOOL`
Toolkit versions	You manage versions manually	Handled automatically

Migrating

Pass your existing auth configs to the session

You already have auth configs (e.g. ac_github_config, ac_slack_config). Pass them when creating a session so it uses your existing OAuth credentials and your users' connected accounts carry over.

from composio import Composio

composio = Composio()

# Before: manual tool fetching with user_id
# tools = composio.tools.get(user_id="user_123", toolkits=["GITHUB", "SLACK"])

# After: create a session with your existing auth configs
session = composio.create(
    user_id="user_123",
    auth_configs={
        "github": "ac_your_github_config",
        "slack": "ac_your_slack_config"
    }
)

Since the session uses the same user_id and auth configs, it automatically picks up existing connected accounts. No re-authentication needed.

Replace manual tool fetching with session tools

Instead of fetching specific tools by name, get the session's meta tools. These let the agent discover, authenticate, and execute any tool at runtime.

# Before: manually specifying which tools to fetch
# tools = composio.tools.get(user_id="user_123", toolkits=["GITHUB"])

# After: session provides meta tools that handle discovery
tools = session.tools()

Remove manual auth flows

If you were manually creating connect links and waiting for connections, sessions handle this automatically. When a tool requires authentication, the agent prompts the user with a connect link in-chat.

# Before: manual auth flow
# connection_request = composio.connected_accounts.link(
#     user_id="user_123",
#     auth_config_id="ac_your_github_config",
#     callback_url="https://your-app.com/callback"
# )
# redirect_url = connection_request.redirect_url

# After: auth happens automatically in-chat
# Or if you need to pre-authenticate outside of chat:
connection_request = session.authorize("github")
print(connection_request.redirect_url)
connected_account = connection_request.wait_for_connection()

Remove toolkit version management

If you were pinning toolkit versions in your code or environment variables, you can remove that. Sessions handle versioning automatically.

# Before: manual version pinning
# composio = Composio(
#     toolkit_versions={
#         "github": "20251027_00",
#         "slack": "20251027_00",
#     }
# )

# After: no version management needed
composio = Composio()
session = composio.create(user_id="user_123")

Restricting toolkits

If you were fetching tools from specific toolkits, you can restrict the session to only those toolkits:

session = composio.create(
    user_id="user_123",
    toolkits=["github", "gmail", "slack"],
    auth_configs={
        "github": "ac_your_github_config",
        "gmail": "ac_your_gmail_config",
        "slack": "ac_your_slack_config"
    }
)

Multiple connected accounts

If your users have multiple accounts for the same toolkit (e.g., work and personal Gmail), you can specify which one to use per session:

session = composio.create(
    user_id="user_123",
    auth_configs={
        "gmail": "ac_your_gmail_config"
    },
    connected_accounts={
        "gmail": ["ca_work_gmail"]
    }
)

If you don't specify, the most recently connected account is used. See Managing multiple connected accounts for details.

Triggers

Triggers don't work with sessions yet. Continue using them the same way you do today with composio.triggers.create(), composio.triggers.enable(), and webhook subscriptions.

See Triggers for setup instructions.

White labeling

If you've set up white-labeled OAuth screens with custom auth configs, those carry over automatically. Just pass the same auth config IDs to your session via auth_configs / authConfigs. Your users will continue to see your branding on consent screens.

See White-labeling authentication for more.

Configuring Sessions

Toolkits, auth configs, account selection, and session methods

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