---
key: pause-or-retire-an-ai-agent
title: Pause or retire an AI teammate
audience: staff
section: settings/ai-agents
routes: ["/settings/org/ai-teammates"]
permissions: ["org.agents.manage"]
features: ["settings.org.ai-agents"]
since: 0.0.1
updated: 0.0.1
status: published
summary: "Stop an AI teammate for a while with Pause, bring it back with Resume, or retire it for good so it is signed out everywhere and its secret stops working."
keywords: [stop an agent, disable bot, turn off AI agent, remove agent, delete agent, agent signed out, pause AI teammate]
related: [add-an-ai-agent-teammate, approve-an-agents-request, turn-ai-on-or-off-for-your-organization]
---

In the sidebar, open **Administration**, then choose **AI Teammates** under **Team & Access**. The page address is `/settings/org/ai-teammates`. Stay on the **Teammates** tab.

## Before you start

Your admin has to give your role the permission to manage AI teammates. A role that can only see AI teammates reads the list without the buttons.

## Steps

To pause a teammate:

1. Find its card and press **Pause**.
2. The status chip changes to **Paused**, and the card shows when it was paused. It is refused the moment it next tries to do anything, and anything it had signed in with stops working. The person accountable for it gets a notification.

To bring it back:

1. Press **Resume** on the paused card. The chip returns to **Active**. It signs in again with the same client id and secret.

To retire a teammate:

1. Press **Retire** on its card.
2. Read the confirmation. Retiring signs it out everywhere, stops its secret, and cannot be undone. Its history in Nova stays as it is.
3. Press **Retire teammate** to confirm. The card shows **Retired**.

## What you see

- A paused teammate keeps its roles, hours, limits and settings, so resuming it needs no setup.
- A retired teammate stays in the list so its past work can still be read, but nothing on its card can be changed.
- Turning AI off for the whole organization stops every teammate at once, as if each were paused; they carry on when AI is turned back on. See [[turn-ai-on-or-off-for-your-organization]].

## If something looks different

- **Pause** and **Retire** are missing: your role cannot manage AI teammates.
- **Resume** shows "Organization AI is not enabled.": AI is off for the organization. An admin has to turn it on under **AI Governance** first.
- You want to keep it but stop one thing it does: press **Edit** and take that action out of **What it can do**, put it under **Ask a person first**, or narrow its **Working hours**. See [[add-an-ai-agent-teammate]].