Context Strategies

Manage Pipecat Flows conversation context across node transitions: the append and reset strategies, and deprecated summarization.

Flows provides three built-in ways to manage conversation context as you move between nodes.

Strategy Types

1. APPEND (Default): New node messages are added to the existing context, preserving the full conversation history. The context grows as the conversation progresses.

2. RESET: The context is cleared and replaced with only the new node’s messages. Useful when previous conversation history is no longer relevant or to reduce context window size.

3. RESET_WITH_SUMMARY: The context is cleared but includes an AI-generated summary of the previous conversation along with the new node’s messages. Helps reduce context size while preserving key information.

RESET_WITH_SUMMARY is deprecated and will be removed in 2.0. Use Pipecat’s native LLMSummarizeContextFrame instead. To trigger on-demand summarization during a node transition, push an LLMSummarizeContextFrame in a pre-action.

When to Use Each Strategy

• Use APPEND when full conversation history is important for context
• Use RESET when starting a new topic or when previous context might confuse the current task
• Use RESET_WITH_SUMMARY (deprecated) for long conversations where you need to preserve key points but reduce context size. Prefer Pipecat’s native context summarization for new code.

Global Configuration

The default strategy for every node is set on the FlowManager constructor, in both forms of flow:

from pipecat.flows import ContextStrategy, ContextStrategyConfig

flow_manager = FlowManager(
    worker=worker,
    llm=llm,
    context_aggregator=context_aggregator,
    context_strategy=ContextStrategyConfig(
        strategy=ContextStrategy.APPEND,
    )
)

Per-Node Configuration

A node can override the global strategy:

Declarative

nodes:
  new_topic:
    context_strategy: reset
    task_messages:
      - role: developer
        content: Ask the customer what else you can help with.

A node’s context_strategy is either append or reset. Omit it to use the FlowManager’s strategy.

RESET_WITH_SUMMARY is not available in a flow config. It takes a summary_prompt alongside the strategy, which a node’s single context_strategy key has nowhere to put. It is deprecated in any case — prefer context summarization.

Programmatic

node_config = NodeConfig(
    task_messages=[...],
    functions=[...],
    context_strategy=ContextStrategyConfig(
        strategy=ContextStrategy.RESET,
    ),
)

The deprecated RESET_WITH_SUMMARY takes a prompt for the summary it generates:

node_config = NodeConfig(
    task_messages=[...],
    functions=[...],
    context_strategy=ContextStrategyConfig(
        strategy=ContextStrategy.RESET_WITH_SUMMARY,
        summary_prompt="Provide a concise summary of the customer's order details and preferences.",
    ),
)