SearXNG search

OpenClaw supports SearXNG as a self-hosted, key-free web_search provider. SearXNG is an open-source meta-search engine that aggregates results from Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, and other sources.

Advantages:

• Free and unlimited -- no API key or commercial subscription required
• Privacy / air-gap -- queries never leave your network
• Works anywhere -- no region restrictions on commercial search APIs

Setup

1. Run a SearXNG instance

   docker run -d -p 8888:8080 searxng/searxng
   

   Or use any existing SearXNG deployment you have access to. See the SearXNG documentation for production setup.

2. Configure

   openclaw configure --section web
   # Select "searxng" as the provider
   

   Or set the env var and let auto-detection find it:

   export SEARXNG_BASE_URL="http://localhost:8888"
   

Config

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

Plugin-level settings for the SearXNG instance:

{
  plugins: {
    entries: {
      searxng: {
        config: {
          webSearch: {
            baseUrl: "http://localhost:8888",
            categories: "general,news", // optional
            language: "en", // optional
          },
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

The baseUrl field also accepts SecretRef objects.

Transport rules:

• https:// works for public or private SearXNG hosts
• http:// is only accepted for trusted private-network or loopback hosts
• public SearXNG hosts must use https://
• private/internal hosts use the self-hosted network guard; public https:// hosts stay on the strict web-search guard and cannot redirect to private addresses

Environment variable

Set SEARXNG_BASE_URL as an alternative to config:

export SEARXNG_BASE_URL="http://localhost:8888"

When SEARXNG_BASE_URL is set and no explicit provider is configured, auto-detection picks SearXNG automatically (at the lowest priority -- any API-backed provider with a key wins first).

Plugin config reference

Notes

• JSON API -- uses SearXNG's native format=json endpoint, not HTML scraping
• Image result URLs -- image-category results include img_src when SearXNG returns a direct image URL
• No API key -- works with any SearXNG instance out of the box
• Base URL validation -- baseUrl must be a valid http:// or https:// URL; public hosts must use https://
• Network guard -- private/internal SearXNG endpoints opt in to private-network access; public https:// SearXNG endpoints keep strict SSRF protection
• Auto-detection order -- SearXNG is checked last (order 200) in auto-detection. API-backed providers with configured keys run first, then DuckDuckGo (order 100), then Ollama Web Search (order 110)
• Self-hosted -- you control the instance, queries, and upstream search engines
• Categories default to general when not configured
• Category fallback -- if a non-general category request succeeds but returns zero results, OpenClaw retries the same query once with general before returning an empty result set

Related

• Web Search overview -- all providers and auto-detection
• DuckDuckGo Search -- another key-free fallback
• Brave Search -- structured results with free tier