Deploy and Host OpenClaw on Railway

OpenClaw AI Agent

OpenClaw (formerly Clawdbot and Moltbot) is the open-source AI agent with 328k+ GitHub stars that goes beyond chat — it browses the web, manages files, runs commands, handles email, and works autonomously on your behalf, accessible from WhatsApp, Telegram, Discord, Slack, iMessage, and 20+ other messaging platforms.

Self-host a personal AI agent for ~$1–3/month — compared to $20/month for ChatGPT Plus, $20/month for Claude Pro, or Manus AI which remains cloud-only and waitlisted. Full data ownership. No usage caps. No subscription.

What This Template Deploys

Service	Purpose
OpenClaw Gateway	Core agent runtime — LLM routing, channel connections, autonomous task execution, and Control UI at `/openclaw`
Persistent Volume (5 GB)	Railway volume at `/data` — config, credentials, memory, and workspace files survive every redeploy

No database. No Redis. No inter-service networking to configure. State lives entirely on the persistent volume — the simplest production OpenClaw stack available on Railway.

About Hosting OpenClaw

Running OpenClaw in production means keeping a persistent Node.js gateway alive 24/7, managing secure credentials for your LLM provider and messaging platforms, handling HTTPS termination, and ensuring config and memory survive redeploys. Without a managed host, you're looking at VPS setup, Nginx config, SSL certificates, process managers, and manual Docker maintenance.

Railway handles all of it. This template mounts a 5 GB persistent volume at /data, provisions the gateway with automatic HTTPS, and injects secrets as environment variables. OpenClaw's memory, channel auth, and workspace survive every redeploy without manual intervention. The browser-based /setup wizard configures everything after deploy — no SSH, no terminal, no config files.

Typical cost: ~$1–3/month on Railway's Hobby plan. ChatGPT Plus costs $20/month. Claude Pro costs $20/month. Manus AI is cloud-only with no self-host option. OpenClaw on Railway gives you an autonomous AI agent at a fraction of the cost with full data ownership.

Deploy in Under 5 Minutes

Click Deploy on Railway and let the initial build complete (~3–5 minutes)
Open your Railway URL and complete the /setup wizard — pick your AI provider and paste your API key
Optionally connect a messaging channel — Telegram bot token, Discord bot token, or Slack app
Start chatting from your browser or messaging app

No SSH. No command line. No server administration.

OpenClaw setup wizard and channel configuration

OpenClaw setup

Common Use Cases

Self-hosted alternative to ChatGPT Plus and Claude Pro — your conversations stay on your Railway instance, not OpenAI or Anthropic servers; swap providers freely without losing memory or configuration
Self-hosted alternative to Manus AI — get the same autonomous agent capability without a waitlist or cloud-only restriction; deploy in minutes on infrastructure you control
Personal AI assistant via WhatsApp or Telegram — message your agent to browse the web, summarize documents, draft emails, or run scheduled tasks from any messaging app you already use
Autonomous task scheduling — configure the heartbeat daemon to run recurring tasks (daily briefings, price monitoring, data pipelines) on a schedule without manual prompting
Multi-platform bot — connect one agent to Telegram, Discord, and Slack simultaneously with shared memory and session context across all channels
Private LLM experimentation — test Anthropic, OpenAI, Gemini, and OpenRouter behind a consistent interface without reconfiguring your setup each time you switch providers

Configuration

Variable	Required	Description
`ANTHROPIC_API_KEY`	Recommended	API key for Anthropic Claude — best results for autonomous tasks and long-context reasoning
`OPENAI_API_KEY`	Alternative	API key for OpenAI GPT models
`GEMINI_API_KEY`	Alternative	API key for Google Gemini
`OPENROUTER_API_KEY`	Alternative	Single key for multiple providers — useful for fallback routing
`SETUP_PASSWORD`	Recommended	Protects the `/setup` wizard — set before sharing your Railway URL
`OPENCLAW_GATEWAY_TOKEN`	Auto-generated	Secure UI-to-gateway token — generated at deploy time
`TELEGRAM_BOT_TOKEN`	Optional	From BotFather — enables Telegram channel
`DISCORD_BOT_TOKEN`	Optional	From Discord Developer Portal — enables Discord channel
`SLACK_BOT_TOKEN`	Optional	From Slack API — enables Slack channel
`OPENCLAW_STATE_DIR`	Pre-set	Defaults to `/data/.openclaw` — do not change unless migrating
`OPENCLAW_VERSION`	Optional	Pin to a specific release e.g. `v2026.2.16` — omit for latest

PORT is injected automatically by Railway. Do not set it manually.

You only need one API key to get started. Everything else is optional and configurable through the /setup wizard after deploy.

OpenClaw vs. Alternatives

	OpenClaw (self-hosted)	ChatGPT Plus	Claude Pro	Manus AI
Monthly cost	~$1–3 (Railway)	$20/month	$20/month	Cloud-only
Self-hostable	✅ Yes	❌ No	❌ No	❌ No
Data ownership	✅ Your instance	❌ OpenAI servers	❌ Anthropic servers	❌ Cloud servers
Usage caps	✅ None	❌ Rate limited	❌ Rate limited	❌ Yes
LLM provider choice	✅ Any provider	❌ OpenAI only	❌ Anthropic only	❌ Fixed
Messaging platforms	✅ 20+ (Telegram, WhatsApp, Discord…)	❌ Web only	❌ Web only	❌ Web only
Autonomous task scheduling	✅ Heartbeat daemon	❌ No	❌ No	✅ Limited
Open source	✅ Yes	❌ No	❌ No	❌ No

Dependencies for OpenClaw Hosting

API key from at least one LLM provider — Anthropic Claude recommended
Railway account (Hobby plan — ~$5/month base, template itself ~$1–3/month)
Optional: bot tokens for Telegram, Discord, or Slack

Deployment Dependencies

Implementation Details

This template deploys OpenClaw's gateway as a persistent container with a 5 GB Railway volume at /data — larger than most competing OpenClaw templates. All agent state lives on the volume: LLM provider config, channel auth tokens, persistent memory, and workspace files. The container is fully stateless — redeploy, version update, or restart without losing anything.

The gateway exposes a Control UI at /openclaw and a setup wizard at /setup, both protected by token-based authentication. No database or Redis instance required — all state is filesystem-based on the persistent volume, keeping the stack simple and the cost low.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is OpenClaw the same as Clawdbot or Moltbot? Yes. OpenClaw was previously known as Clawdbot and before that as Moltbot. The project was rebranded to OpenClaw. It is the same agent — same team, same codebase, continued development. Existing Clawdbot or Moltbot users can migrate their data by moving the /data volume contents.

How much does OpenClaw cost to run on Railway vs ChatGPT or Claude? The Railway container costs ~$1–3/month on the Hobby plan. ChatGPT Plus is $20/month with rate limits. Claude Pro is $20/month with usage caps. Manus AI has no self-hosted option. LLM API costs are separate and depend on usage — Claude Haiku or GPT-4o-mini keep inference costs low for personal use.

What makes this template different from other OpenClaw Railway templates? This template ships with a 5 GB persistent volume — larger than the standard 1–2 GB most competing templates configure. It also requires zero manual environment variable setup beyond your API key: the /setup wizard handles channel configuration, provider selection, and credential management entirely in the browser. No SSH, no config files, no token generation.

Is my data private? Yes. OpenClaw is fully self-hosted. Conversations stay on your Railway instance. API keys are stored as encrypted Railway environment variables. No data is sent to third-party analytics.

Do I lose config and memory when Railway redeploys? No. All state is stored on the persistent volume at /data, not inside the container. Redeploys, version updates, and restarts do not affect your data.

How do I update OpenClaw to a newer version? Set OPENCLAW_VERSION to the target release (e.g. v2026.2.16) in Railway Variables and redeploy. Set to latest to always pull the newest release on each deploy.

Why Deploy OpenClaw on Railway?

Railway is a singular platform to deploy your infrastructure stack. Railway will host your infrastructure so you don't have to deal with configuration, while allowing you to vertically and horizontally scale it.

By deploying OpenClaw on Railway, you get a 24/7 personal AI agent with persistent memory, secure credential management, automatic HTTPS, and zero server administration — for ~$1–3/month. Own your data. Control your AI provider. Scale when you need to.