openclaw/docs/tools/web.md

summary, read_when, title

summary	read_when	title
Web search + fetch tools (Brave, Gemini, Grok, Kimi, and Perplexity providers)	You want to enable web_search or web_fetch You need provider API key setup You want to use Gemini with Google Search grounding	Web Tools

Web tools

OpenClaw ships two lightweight web tools:

• web_search — Search the web using Brave Search API, Gemini with Google Search grounding, Grok, Kimi, or Perplexity Search API.
• web_fetch — HTTP fetch + readable extraction (HTML → markdown/text).

These are not browser automation. For JS-heavy sites or logins, use the Browser tool.

How it works

• web_search calls your configured provider and returns results.
• Results are cached by query for 15 minutes (configurable).
• web_fetch does a plain HTTP GET and extracts readable content (HTML → markdown/text). It does not execute JavaScript.
• web_fetch is enabled by default (unless explicitly disabled).

See Brave Search setup and Perplexity Search setup for provider-specific details.

Choosing a search provider

Provider	Result shape	Provider-specific filters	Notes	API key
Brave Search API	Structured results with snippets	country, language, ui_lang, time	Supports Brave llm-context mode	BRAVE_API_KEY
Gemini	AI-synthesized answers + citations	—	Uses Google Search grounding	GEMINI_API_KEY
Grok	AI-synthesized answers + citations	—	Uses xAI web-grounded responses	XAI_API_KEY
Kimi	AI-synthesized answers + citations	—	Uses Moonshot web search	KIMI_API_KEY / MOONSHOT_API_KEY
Perplexity Search API	Structured results with snippets	country, language, time, domain_filter	Supports content extraction controls; OpenRouter uses Sonar compatibility path	PERPLEXITY_API_KEY / OPENROUTER_API_KEY

Auto-detection

The table above is alphabetical. If no provider is explicitly set, runtime auto-detection checks providers in this order:

1. Brave — BRAVE_API_KEY env var or tools.web.search.apiKey config
2. Gemini — GEMINI_API_KEY env var or tools.web.search.gemini.apiKey config
3. Grok — XAI_API_KEY env var or tools.web.search.grok.apiKey config
4. Kimi — KIMI_API_KEY / MOONSHOT_API_KEY env var or tools.web.search.kimi.apiKey config
5. Perplexity — PERPLEXITY_API_KEY, OPENROUTER_API_KEY, or tools.web.search.perplexity.apiKey config

If no keys are found, it falls back to Brave (you'll get a missing-key error prompting you to configure one).

Runtime SecretRef behavior:

• Web tool SecretRefs are resolved atomically at gateway startup/reload.
• In auto-detect mode, OpenClaw resolves only the selected provider key. Non-selected provider SecretRefs stay inactive until selected.
• If the selected provider SecretRef is unresolved and no provider env fallback exists, startup/reload fails fast.

Setting up web search

Use openclaw configure --section web to set up your API key and choose a provider.

Brave Search

1. Create a Brave Search API account at brave.com/search/api
2. In the dashboard, choose the Search plan and generate an API key.
3. Run openclaw configure --section web to store the key in config, or set BRAVE_API_KEY in your environment.

Each Brave plan includes $5/month in free credit (renewing). The Search plan costs $5 per 1,000 requests, so the credit covers 1,000 queries/month. Set your usage limit in the Brave dashboard to avoid unexpected charges. See the Brave API portal for current plans and pricing.

Perplexity Search

1. Create a Perplexity account at perplexity.ai/settings/api
2. Generate an API key in the dashboard
3. Run openclaw configure --section web to store the key in config, or set PERPLEXITY_API_KEY in your environment.

For legacy Sonar/OpenRouter compatibility, set OPENROUTER_API_KEY instead, or configure tools.web.search.perplexity.apiKey with an sk-or-... key. Setting tools.web.search.perplexity.baseUrl or model also opts Perplexity back into the chat-completions compatibility path.

See Perplexity Search API Docs for more details.

Where to store the key

Via config: run openclaw configure --section web. It stores the key under the provider-specific config path:

• Brave: tools.web.search.apiKey
• Gemini: tools.web.search.gemini.apiKey
• Grok: tools.web.search.grok.apiKey
• Kimi: tools.web.search.kimi.apiKey
• Perplexity: tools.web.search.perplexity.apiKey

All of these fields also support SecretRef objects.

Via environment: set provider env vars in the Gateway process environment:

• Brave: BRAVE_API_KEY
• Gemini: GEMINI_API_KEY
• Grok: XAI_API_KEY
• Kimi: KIMI_API_KEY or MOONSHOT_API_KEY
• Perplexity: PERPLEXITY_API_KEY or OPENROUTER_API_KEY

For a gateway install, put these in ~/.openclaw/.env (or your service environment). See Env vars.

Config examples

Brave Search:

{
  tools: {
    web: {
      search: {
        enabled: true,
        provider: "brave",
        apiKey: "YOUR_BRAVE_API_KEY", // optional if BRAVE_API_KEY is set // pragma: allowlist secret
      },
    },
  },
}

Brave LLM Context mode:

{
  tools: {
    web: {
      search: {
        enabled: true,
        provider: "brave",
        apiKey: "YOUR_BRAVE_API_KEY", // optional if BRAVE_API_KEY is set // pragma: allowlist secret
        brave: {
          mode: "llm-context",
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

llm-context returns extracted page chunks for grounding instead of standard Brave snippets. In this mode, country and language / search_lang still work, but ui_lang, freshness, date_after, and date_before are rejected.

Perplexity Search:

{
  tools: {
    web: {
      search: {
        enabled: true,
        provider: "perplexity",
        perplexity: {
          apiKey: "pplx-...", // optional if PERPLEXITY_API_KEY is set
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

Perplexity via OpenRouter / Sonar compatibility:

{
  tools: {
    web: {
      search: {
        enabled: true,
        provider: "perplexity",
        perplexity: {
          apiKey: "<openrouter-api-key>", // optional if OPENROUTER_API_KEY is set
          baseUrl: "https://openrouter.ai/api/v1",
          model: "perplexity/sonar-pro",
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

Using Gemini (Google Search grounding)

Gemini models support built-in Google Search grounding, which returns AI-synthesized answers backed by live Google Search results with citations.

Getting a Gemini API key

1. Go to Google AI Studio
2. Create an API key
3. Set GEMINI_API_KEY in the Gateway environment, or configure tools.web.search.gemini.apiKey

Setting up Gemini search

{
  tools: {
    web: {
      search: {
        provider: "gemini",
        gemini: {
          // API key (optional if GEMINI_API_KEY is set)
          apiKey: "AIza...",
          // Model (defaults to "gemini-2.5-flash")
          model: "gemini-2.5-flash",
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

Environment alternative: set GEMINI_API_KEY in the Gateway environment. For a gateway install, put it in ~/.openclaw/.env.

Notes

• Citation URLs from Gemini grounding are automatically resolved from Google's redirect URLs to direct URLs.
• Redirect resolution uses the SSRF guard path (HEAD + redirect checks + http/https validation) before returning the final citation URL.
• Redirect resolution uses strict SSRF defaults, so redirects to private/internal targets are blocked.
• The default model (gemini-2.5-flash) is fast and cost-effective. Any Gemini model that supports grounding can be used.

web_search

Search the web using your configured provider.

Requirements

• tools.web.search.enabled must not be false (default: enabled)
• API key for your chosen provider:
  • Brave: BRAVE_API_KEY or tools.web.search.apiKey
  • Gemini: GEMINI_API_KEY or tools.web.search.gemini.apiKey
  • Grok: XAI_API_KEY or tools.web.search.grok.apiKey
  • Kimi: KIMI_API_KEY, MOONSHOT_API_KEY, or tools.web.search.kimi.apiKey
  • Perplexity: PERPLEXITY_API_KEY, OPENROUTER_API_KEY, or tools.web.search.perplexity.apiKey
• All provider key fields above support SecretRef objects.

Config

{
  tools: {
    web: {
      search: {
        enabled: true,
        apiKey: "BRAVE_API_KEY_HERE", // optional if BRAVE_API_KEY is set
        maxResults: 5,
        timeoutSeconds: 30,
        cacheTtlMinutes: 15,
      },
    },
  },
}

Tool parameters

All parameters work for Brave and for native Perplexity Search API unless noted.

Perplexity's OpenRouter / Sonar compatibility path supports only query and freshness. If you set tools.web.search.perplexity.baseUrl / model, use OPENROUTER_API_KEY, or configure an sk-or-... key, Search API-only filters return explicit errors.

Parameter	Description
query	Search query (required)
count	Results to return (1-10, default: 5)
country	2-letter ISO country code (e.g., "US", "DE")
language	ISO 639-1 language code (e.g., "en", "de")
freshness	Time filter: day, week, month, or year
date_after	Results after this date (YYYY-MM-DD)
date_before	Results before this date (YYYY-MM-DD)
ui_lang	UI language code (Brave only)
domain_filter	Domain allowlist/denylist array (Perplexity only)
max_tokens	Total content budget, default 25000 (Perplexity only)
max_tokens_per_page	Per-page token limit, default 2048 (Perplexity only)

Examples:

// German-specific search
await web_search({
  query: "TV online schauen",
  country: "DE",
  language: "de",
});

// Recent results (past week)
await web_search({
  query: "TMBG interview",
  freshness: "week",
});

// Date range search
await web_search({
  query: "AI developments",
  date_after: "2024-01-01",
  date_before: "2024-06-30",
});

// Domain filtering (Perplexity only)
await web_search({
  query: "climate research",
  domain_filter: ["nature.com", "science.org", ".edu"],
});

// Exclude domains (Perplexity only)
await web_search({
  query: "product reviews",
  domain_filter: ["-reddit.com", "-pinterest.com"],
});

// More content extraction (Perplexity only)
await web_search({
  query: "detailed AI research",
  max_tokens: 50000,
  max_tokens_per_page: 4096,
});

When Brave llm-context mode is enabled, ui_lang, freshness, date_after, and date_before are not supported. Use Brave web mode for those filters.

web_fetch

Fetch a URL and extract readable content.

web_fetch requirements

• tools.web.fetch.enabled must not be false (default: enabled)
• Optional Firecrawl fallback: set tools.web.fetch.firecrawl.apiKey or FIRECRAWL_API_KEY.
• tools.web.fetch.firecrawl.apiKey supports SecretRef objects.

web_fetch config

{
  tools: {
    web: {
      fetch: {
        enabled: true,
        maxChars: 50000,
        maxCharsCap: 50000,
        maxResponseBytes: 2000000,
        timeoutSeconds: 30,
        cacheTtlMinutes: 15,
        maxRedirects: 3,
        userAgent: "Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 14_7_2) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/122.0.0.0 Safari/537.36",
        readability: true,
        firecrawl: {
          enabled: true,
          apiKey: "FIRECRAWL_API_KEY_HERE", // optional if FIRECRAWL_API_KEY is set
          baseUrl: "https://api.firecrawl.dev",
          onlyMainContent: true,
          maxAgeMs: 86400000, // ms (1 day)
          timeoutSeconds: 60,
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

web_fetch tool parameters

• url (required, http/https only)
• extractMode (markdown | text)
• maxChars (truncate long pages)

Notes:

• web_fetch uses Readability (main-content extraction) first, then Firecrawl (if configured). If both fail, the tool returns an error.
• Firecrawl requests use bot-circumvention mode and cache results by default.
• Firecrawl SecretRefs are resolved only when Firecrawl is active (tools.web.fetch.enabled !== false and tools.web.fetch.firecrawl.enabled !== false).
• If Firecrawl is active and its SecretRef is unresolved with no FIRECRAWL_API_KEY fallback, startup/reload fails fast.
• web_fetch sends a Chrome-like User-Agent and Accept-Language by default; override userAgent if needed.
• web_fetch blocks private/internal hostnames and re-checks redirects (limit with maxRedirects).
• maxChars is clamped to tools.web.fetch.maxCharsCap.
• web_fetch caps the downloaded response body size to tools.web.fetch.maxResponseBytes before parsing; oversized responses are truncated and include a warning.
• web_fetch is best-effort extraction; some sites will need the browser tool.
• See Firecrawl for key setup and service details.
• Responses are cached (default 15 minutes) to reduce repeated fetches.
• If you use tool profiles/allowlists, add web_search/web_fetch or group:web.
• If the API key is missing, web_search returns a short setup hint with a docs link.