openclaw/docs/providers/xai.md

summary	read_when	title
Use xAI Grok models in OpenClaw	You want to use Grok models in OpenClaw You are configuring xAI auth or model ids	xAI

xAI

OpenClaw ships a bundled xai provider plugin for Grok models.

Setup

1. Create an API key in the xAI console.
2. Set XAI_API_KEY, or run:

openclaw onboard --auth-choice xai-api-key

3. Pick a model such as:

{
  agents: { defaults: { model: { primary: "xai/grok-4" } } },
}

OpenClaw now uses the xAI Responses API as the bundled xAI transport. The same XAI_API_KEY can also power Grok-backed web_search and first-class x_search. If you store an xAI key under plugins.entries.xai.config.webSearch.apiKey, the bundled xAI model provider now reuses that key as a fallback too.

Current bundled model catalog

OpenClaw now includes these xAI model families out of the box:

• grok-4, grok-4-0709
• grok-4-fast-reasoning, grok-4-fast-non-reasoning
• grok-4-1-fast-reasoning, grok-4-1-fast-non-reasoning
• grok-4.20-reasoning, grok-4.20-non-reasoning
• grok-code-fast-1

The plugin also forward-resolves newer grok-4* and grok-code-fast* ids when they follow the same API shape.

Web search

The bundled grok web-search provider uses XAI_API_KEY too:

openclaw config set tools.web.search.provider grok

Known limits

• Auth is API-key only today. There is no xAI OAuth/device-code flow in OpenClaw yet.
• grok-4.20-multi-agent-experimental-beta-0304 is not supported on the normal xAI provider path because it requires a different upstream API surface than the standard OpenClaw xAI transport.

Notes

• OpenClaw applies xAI-specific tool-schema and tool-call compatibility fixes automatically on the shared runner path.
• web_search and x_search are exposed as OpenClaw tools. OpenClaw enables the specific xAI built-in it needs inside each tool request instead of attaching both search tools to every chat turn.
• For the broader provider overview, see Model providers.