Exa search

Exa AI is a web_search provider with neural, keyword, and hybrid search modes plus built-in content extraction (highlights, text, summaries).

Install plugin

bash

openclaw plugins install @openclaw/exa-plugin
openclaw gateway restart

Get an API key

<Steps> <Step title="Create an account"> Sign up at [exa.ai](https://exa.ai/) and generate an API key from your dashboard. </Step> <Step title="Store the key"> Set `EXA_API_KEY` in the Gateway environment, or configure via:

```bash
openclaw configure --section web
```

</Step> </Steps>

Config

json5

{
  plugins: {
    entries: {
      exa: {
        config: {
          webSearch: {
            apiKey: "exa-...", // optional if EXA_API_KEY is set
            baseUrl: "https://api.exa.ai", // optional; OpenClaw appends /search
          },
        },
      },
    },
  },
  tools: {
    web: {
      search: {
        provider: "exa",
      },
    },
  },
}

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

Base URL override

Set plugins.entries.exa.config.webSearch.baseUrl to route Exa search requests through a compatible proxy or alternate endpoint. OpenClaw normalizes bare hosts by prepending https:// and appends /search unless the path already ends there. The resolved endpoint is part of the search cache key, so results from different endpoints are never shared.

Tool parameters

<ParamField path="query" type="string" required> Search query. </ParamField> <ParamField path="count" type="number" default="5"> Results to return (1-100, subject to Exa search-type limits). </ParamField> <ParamField path="type" type="'auto' | 'neural' | 'fast' | 'deep' | 'deep-reasoning' | 'instant'"> Search mode. </ParamField> <ParamField path="freshness" type="'day' | 'week' | 'month' | 'year'"> Time filter. Cannot be combined with `date_after`/`date_before`. </ParamField> <ParamField path="date_after" type="string"> Results after this date (`YYYY-MM-DD`). </ParamField> <ParamField path="date_before" type="string"> Results before this date (`YYYY-MM-DD`). </ParamField> <ParamField path="contents" type="object"> Content extraction options (see below). </ParamField>

Content extraction

Pass a contents object to control extracted content in results:

javascript

await web_search({
  query: "transformer architecture explained",
  type: "neural",
  contents: {
    text: true, // full page text
    highlights: { numSentences: 3 }, // key sentences
    summary: true, // AI summary
  },
});

Contents option	Type	Description
`text`	`boolean \| { maxCharacters }`	Extract full page text
`highlights`	`boolean \| { maxCharacters, query, numSentences, highlightsPerUrl }`	Extract key sentences
`summary`	`boolean \| { query }`	AI-generated summary

If contents is omitted, Exa defaults to { highlights: true } so results include key-sentence excerpts. Result descriptions resolve from highlights first, then summary, then full text -- whichever is available first. Results also preserve the raw highlightScores and summary fields from the Exa API response when available.

Search modes

Mode	Description
`auto`	Exa picks the best mode (default)
`neural`	Semantic/meaning-based search
`fast`	Quick keyword search
`deep`	Thorough deep search
`deep-reasoning`	Deep search with reasoning
`instant`	Fastest results

Notes

count accepts up to 100, subject to Exa search-type limits.
Results are cached for 15 minutes by default. Configure the shared tools.web.search.cacheTtlMinutes (minutes) and tools.web.search.timeoutSeconds (default 30s) to change caching and request timeout for all web_search providers, including Exa.

Web Search overview -- all providers and auto-detection
Brave Search -- structured results with country/language filters
Perplexity Search -- structured results with domain filtering