OpenClaw

What it does

OpenClaw is a self-hosted gateway that connects chat apps such as WhatsApp, Telegram, Discord, Slack, Signal, and iMessage to AI coding agents. Messages from those apps go in, and agent responses and actions come out, including web browsing, form filling, file reading and writing, shell commands, and replies in the same chat. A single Gateway process runs on your own machine or server and manages sessions, routing, and channel connections.

People use it as a personal assistant that keeps preferences and projects across conversations, or as a shared team gateway where several members work in the same sessions. You can add community skills or plugins from ClawHub, schedule recurring jobs with cron, and connect integrations such as Gmail, GitHub, Obsidian, and Hue. Because state stays on your own hardware rather than a vendor cloud, the software is MIT licensed and has no paid edition.

OpenClaw suits developers, power users, and teams comfortable installing a Node-based tool and supplying their own model access. It installs with a one-line script or npm on macOS, Linux, and Windows, and desktop apps are also available. Model use requires an API key or subscription from a provider you choose, and full system access can be sandboxed, though granting it carries security responsibility on the user.

What it can do

• Multi-channel messaging via one Gateway across chat apps
• Persistent memory of preferences, projects, and people
• Web browsing, form filling, and file read/write with optional sandboxing
• Shell command execution on the host machine
• Skills and plugins extension via ClawHub
• Scheduled recurring jobs and webhooks

Works with

• WhatsApp
• Telegram
• Discord
• Slack
• Signal
• iMessage
• Gmail
• GitHub
• Obsidian
• Spotify

Before you choose

• Requires your own model access (API key or subscription) from a provider you choose.
• Full system access (shell, files, web) can be sandboxed; the security choice is yours.
• macOS first run may need an Administrator for Homebrew; Windows support is listed as beta.

Listed under

• Productivity
• General assistants
• Scheduling and calendar
• Calendar
• Developers
• Email
• Messaging
• Open source
• Personal assistant

Get started

Run the install script or npm i -g openclaw, then openclaw onboard.

1. Run the install command for your OS (curl script, PowerShell script, or npm i -g openclaw).
2. Run openclaw onboard to complete guided setup and connect your AI access.
3. Install the background Gateway service with openclaw gateway install and connect a channel such as Telegram.

Confirm the applicable plan, usage charges and commercial terms with the provider.

We couldn’t find published prices for OpenClaw. See their pricing page ↗

Sources for this overview

Product pages, documentation, and pricing checked 29 Oct 2026. Each source supports part of the overview; availability and prices can change.

• OpenClaw — Open-Source AI Assistant ↗openclaw.ai
• OpenClaw Docs ↗docs.openclaw.ai

Company website

openclaw.ai: product, pricing and policy pages

YC directory mirror

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Social accounts

Accounts the company links, and its posts on X

Human review

Checked by a person

knowledge_base

Last checked 29 Oct 2026. Every field keeps its source and date; unknown means we couldn’t confirm it.