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Firecrawl

docs/tools/firecrawl.md

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OpenClaw can use Firecrawl in three ways:

  • as the web_search provider
  • as explicit plugin tools: firecrawl_search and firecrawl_scrape
  • as a fallback extractor for web_fetch

It is a hosted extraction/search service that supports bot circumvention and caching, which helps with JS-heavy sites or pages that block plain HTTP fetches.

Get an API key

  1. Create a Firecrawl account and generate an API key.
  2. Store it in config or set FIRECRAWL_API_KEY in the gateway environment.
json5
{
  tools: {
    web: {
      search: {
        provider: "firecrawl",
      },
    },
  },
  plugins: {
    entries: {
      firecrawl: {
        enabled: true,
        config: {
          webSearch: {
            apiKey: "FIRECRAWL_API_KEY_HERE",
            baseUrl: "https://api.firecrawl.dev",
          },
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

Notes:

  • Choosing Firecrawl in onboarding or openclaw configure --section web enables the bundled Firecrawl plugin automatically.
  • web_search with Firecrawl supports query and count.
  • For Firecrawl-specific controls like sources, categories, or result scraping, use firecrawl_search.
  • baseUrl defaults to hosted Firecrawl at https://api.firecrawl.dev. Self-hosted overrides are allowed only for private/internal endpoints; HTTP is accepted only for those private targets.
  • FIRECRAWL_BASE_URL is the shared env fallback for Firecrawl search and scrape base URLs.

Configure Firecrawl scrape + web_fetch fallback

json5
{
  plugins: {
    entries: {
      firecrawl: {
        enabled: true,
        config: {
          webFetch: {
            apiKey: "FIRECRAWL_API_KEY_HERE",
            baseUrl: "https://api.firecrawl.dev",
            onlyMainContent: true,
            maxAgeMs: 172800000,
            timeoutSeconds: 60,
          },
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

Notes:

  • Firecrawl fallback attempts run only when an API key is available (plugins.entries.firecrawl.config.webFetch.apiKey or FIRECRAWL_API_KEY).
  • maxAgeMs controls how old cached results can be (ms). Default is 2 days.
  • Legacy tools.web.fetch.firecrawl.* config is auto-migrated by openclaw doctor --fix.
  • Firecrawl scrape/base URL overrides follow the same hosted/private rule as search: public hosted traffic uses https://api.firecrawl.dev; self-hosted overrides must resolve to private/internal endpoints.
  • firecrawl_scrape rejects obvious private, loopback, metadata, and non-HTTP(S) target URLs before forwarding them to Firecrawl, matching the web_fetch target-safety contract for explicit Firecrawl scrape calls.

firecrawl_scrape reuses the same plugins.entries.firecrawl.config.webFetch.* settings and env vars.

Self-hosted Firecrawl

Set plugins.entries.firecrawl.config.webSearch.baseUrl, plugins.entries.firecrawl.config.webFetch.baseUrl, or FIRECRAWL_BASE_URL when you run Firecrawl yourself. OpenClaw accepts http:// only for loopback, private-network, .local, .internal, or .localhost targets. Public custom hosts are rejected so Firecrawl API keys are not sent to arbitrary endpoints by accident.

Firecrawl plugin tools

Use this when you want Firecrawl-specific search controls instead of generic web_search.

Core parameters:

  • query
  • count
  • sources
  • categories
  • scrapeResults
  • timeoutSeconds

firecrawl_scrape

Use this for JS-heavy or bot-protected pages where plain web_fetch is weak.

Core parameters:

  • url
  • extractMode
  • maxChars
  • onlyMainContent
  • maxAgeMs
  • proxy
  • storeInCache
  • timeoutSeconds

Stealth / bot circumvention

Firecrawl exposes a proxy mode parameter for bot circumvention (basic, stealth, or auto). OpenClaw always uses proxy: "auto" plus storeInCache: true for Firecrawl requests. If proxy is omitted, Firecrawl defaults to auto. auto retries with stealth proxies if a basic attempt fails, which may use more credits than basic-only scraping.

How web_fetch uses Firecrawl

web_fetch extraction order:

  1. Readability (local)
  2. Firecrawl (if selected or auto-detected as the active web-fetch fallback)
  3. Basic HTML cleanup (last fallback)

The selection knob is tools.web.fetch.provider. If you omit it, OpenClaw auto-detects the first ready web-fetch provider from available credentials. Today the bundled provider is Firecrawl.