OpenClaw
OpenClaw is an excellent, MIT-licensed autonomous agent that runs on your own hardware and works through the messaging apps you already use. We rate it a strong second to Hermes — and that's high praise, not a knock. We set it up, tune it, and maintain it on your infrastructure — wiring in the dashboards, plugins, and channels from its ClawHub ecosystem that fit your workflow — and support the whole lifecycle.
Why OpenClaw is still a great choice
- • Open source and MIT-licensed, with a public repository — yours to run, fork, and own outright.
- • Messaging-first: it lives where you already are, taking action through channels like Telegram, Discord, Slack, WhatsApp, and Signal via a persistent gateway.
- • An autonomous agent that executes real tasks through LLMs, around the clock, on hardware you control.
- • Mature and well-loved, now stewarded by an independent non-profit foundation — its creator, Peter Steinberger, moved on to OpenAI in early 2026.
- • Plugin-first and extensible: channels, dashboards, observability, voice, and more install as plugins from the ClawHub marketplace — and it maps Codex, Claude, and Cursor plugin layouts into its own inventory.
What we do
Included
- • Install and configure OpenClaw on your infrastructure
- • Provider and credential wiring across your model and tool stack
- • Messaging-channel integration (Telegram, Discord, Slack, WhatsApp, Signal, and more)
- • Skill, prompt, and workflow tuning against your actual tasks
- • Observability, cost guardrails, and reliability hardening
- • Plugin and dashboard setup from the ClawHub ecosystem — channels, observability, and the extensions you need
- • Version upgrades and ongoing maintenance/tuning
- • Runbook + handoff so your team can operate it without us
Not included
- • Hosting by REAA — OpenClaw runs on your infrastructure, under your accounts
- • LLM API and infrastructure costs (your accounts; pass-through, no markup)
- • A monthly subscription — maintenance/tuning is hourly work, scheduled when you want it
Plugins, extensions & dashboards
OpenClaw is plugin-first: channels, model providers, tools, skills, voice, media, and more load as plugins through its manifest system, discoverable in the ClawHub marketplace and installable from npm or Git. It even maps Codex, Claude, and Cursor plugin layouts into its own inventory. We set up the dashboard, channels, and extensions you need, and tune the plugin policy — allow/deny lists, per-plugin enablement — for safe operation.
Popular plugins, dashboards & extensions
- Observatory — Self-hosted dashboard tracking sessions, costs, and failures across your agent.
- Manifest — Real-time cost tracking for LLM tokens across 28+ models.
- Opik-OpenClaw — Agent trace exports with span-level usage metadata for observability tooling.
- Better Gateway — Enhanced UI with auto-reconnect and network awareness.
- Home Assistant — Run OpenClaw directly inside your Home Assistant smart-home stack.
- Model Selector — Smart model routing with suggestion-and-confirmation workflows.
- GuardSpine — Deny-by-default tool access with risk-tier verification — governance for autonomous runs.
- voice-call — Outbound phone calls and multi-turn voice conversations (Twilio).
The ecosystem moves fast — these are popular community plugins as of 2026. Part of every engagement is recommending the right set for your use case and keeping them current.
How an engagement works
- 01
First conversation (free)
30 min. We learn your use case and infra, and give you an honest read on whether OpenClaw or Hermes is the better fit. No pressure.
- 02
Setup on your infra
We install and configure OpenClaw on your accounts — providers, credentials, channels, dashboards, plugins, observability, cost guardrails. You own everything.
- 03
Tuning
We tune skills, prompts, plugins, and workflows against your real tasks until it behaves the way you need in production.
- 04
Handoff + optional maintenance
Runbook delivered; your team can self-operate. Keep us on for periodic tuning and upgrades, or call us when you need us. Hourly either way.
Pricing
$600/hour — it's senior time, the same rate as our advisory and training. Setup, tuning, and maintenance all bill the same way.
OpenClaw runs on your infrastructure: LLM API and hosting costs are yours directly, pass-through with no markup. No subscription, no lock-in — it's open source, and you can take it in-house the moment the runbook is in your hands.
FAQ
How does OpenClaw compare to Hermes?
We rate Hermes the best available and OpenClaw a strong second — and "second" here is high praise. OpenClaw is an excellent, mature, messaging-first agent that a lot of people rely on. If your team is already invested in it, or its messaging-channel model fits how you work, it's a genuinely good choice and we're glad to support it. If you're starting fresh and want our top recommendation, we'll point you at Hermes — and tell you why.
Who's behind OpenClaw?
It was created by Peter Steinberger and is MIT-licensed open source. After Steinberger joined OpenAI in early 2026, stewardship moved to an independent non-profit foundation. (It is not a Nous Research project — that's Hermes.) We follow OpenClaw's progress closely on X, even though we don't run it ourselves anymore.
Do you run OpenClaw yourselves?
Not anymore — we moved our own workloads to Hermes. But we ran OpenClaw, we know it well, and we keep up with its development. The setup and tuning expertise is real and current.
What does it cost?
Setup, maintenance, and tuning bill at our standard hourly rate — senior time, the same rate as advisory and training. LLM and infrastructure costs are yours directly, pass-through with no markup. No subscription, no lock-in.
Running OpenClaw, or thinking about it?
First conversation is free — 30 minutes. We'll give you a straight comparison with Hermes and a clear recommendation before either of us commits.