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OpenClaw

Use Aurora as the inference provider for an OpenClaw assistant. Configure a custom provider and select its model as the agent default.

Select Inference Endpoint
Choose preferred region.

Install and prepare​

Follow the OpenClaw getting-started guide to install and initialize the gateway. Create an Aurora token. For an interactive process:

export AURORA_API_TOKEN="<your-token>"

If the gateway runs as a service, put the variable in its service environment or OpenClaw's ~/.openclaw/.env file instead:

AURORA_API_TOKEN=<your-token>

Configure the provider and default model​

Merge this into ~/.openclaw/openclaw.json:

{
"models": {
  "mode": "merge",
  "providers": {
    "aurora": {
      "baseUrl": "",
      "apiKey": "${AURORA_API_TOKEN}",
      "api": "openai-completions",
      "models": [
        {
          "id": "deepseek/deepseek-v4-flash",
          "name": "DeepSeek V4 Flash (Aurora)",
          "input": ["text"]
        }
      ]
    }
  }
},
"agents": {
  "defaults": {
    "model": {
      "primary": "aurora/deepseek/deepseek-v4-flash"
    }
  }
}
}

openai-completions selects Chat Completions. OpenClaw uses the first aurora/ segment for routing and sends deepseek/deepseek-v4-flash to Aurora. Registering a provider alone does not change the default model; both sections matter.

For long conversations, configure model-specific contextWindow and maxTokens from the selected model's limits. OpenClaw's fallback budgets and zero-valued custom-provider cost estimates are not Aurora limits or pricing.

Start and verify​

For an installed gateway service, restart it to load the credential, then check the model configuration:

openclaw gateway restart
openclaw models list
openclaw models status
openclaw tui

If you run the gateway in the foreground, restart that process instead. Start a new chat in the TUI and confirm the Aurora model is selected. Ask it to say hello, then ask:

Read AGENTS.md in your workspace and summarize it in three bullets. Do not edit files.

Substitute another existing workspace file if needed. Expect a tool result and an answer based on the file. OpenClaw handles streaming in its chat interface.

Troubleshooting​

  • Missing environment variable: A gateway service does not inherit exports from your current terminal. Configure its environment and restart it.
  • Another model still answers: Check agent-specific overrides, existing sessions, and fallback models in addition to agents.defaults.model.primary.
  • Provider exists but model is missing: Include the model in models.providers.aurora.models; an alias alone does not register it.
  • Text works, other features fail: Web search, embeddings, audio, and image generation have their own configuration. This connects the main text model.

See shared troubleshooting and OpenClaw's custom provider reference.