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DuckDuckGo Search

Mirrored from OpenClaw (MIT)
Canonical source: https://docs.openclaw.ai/tools/duckduckgo-search
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DuckDuckGo Search

OpenClaw supports DuckDuckGo as a key-free web_search provider. No API key or account is required.

WARNING

DuckDuckGo is an experimental, unofficial integration that pulls results from DuckDuckGo's non-JavaScript search pages — not an official API. Expect occasional breakage from bot-challenge pages or HTML changes.

Setup

No API key needed — just set DuckDuckGo as your provider:

  1. Configure
    openclaw configure --section web
# Select "duckduckgo" as the provider

Config

{
  tools: {
    web: {
      search: {
        provider: "duckduckgo",
      },
    },
  },
}

Optional plugin-level settings for region and SafeSearch:

{
  plugins: {
    entries: {
      duckduckgo: {
        config: {
          webSearch: {
            region: "us-en", // DuckDuckGo region code
            safeSearch: "moderate", // "strict", "moderate", or "off"
          },
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

Tool parameters

ParameterDescription
querySearch query (required)
countResults to return (1-10, default: 5)
regionDuckDuckGo region code (e.g. us-en, uk-en, de-de)
safeSearchSafeSearch level: strict, moderate (default), or off

Region and SafeSearch can also be set in plugin config (see above) — tool parameters override config values per-query.

Notes

  • No API key — works out of the box, zero configuration
  • Experimental — gathers results from DuckDuckGo's non-JavaScript HTML search pages, not an official API or SDK
  • Bot-challenge risk — DuckDuckGo may serve CAPTCHAs or block requests under heavy or automated use
  • HTML parsing — results depend on page structure, which can change without notice
  • Auto-detection order — DuckDuckGo is the first key-free fallback (order 100) in auto-detection. API-backed providers with configured keys run first, then Ollama Web Search (order 110), then SearXNG (order 200)
  • SafeSearch defaults to moderate when not configured
TIP

For production use, consider Brave Search (free tier available) or another API-backed provider.