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OpenClaw does not install every bundled plugin dependency tree at package install time. It first derives an effective plugin plan from config and plugin metadata, then stages runtime dependencies only for bundled OpenClaw-owned plugins that the plan can actually load. This page covers packaged runtime dependencies for bundled OpenClaw plugins. Third-party plugins and custom plugin paths still use explicit plugin installation commands such as openclaw plugins install and openclaw plugins update.

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Responsibility split

OpenClaw owns the plan and policy:
  • which plugins are active for this config
  • which dependency roots are writable or read-only
  • when repair is allowed
  • which plugin ids are staged for startup
  • final checks before importing plugin runtime modules
The package manager owns dependency convergence:
  • package graph resolution
  • production, optional, and peer dependency handling
  • node_modules layout
  • package integrity
  • lock and install metadata
In practice, OpenClaw should decide what needs to exist. pnpm or npm should make the filesystem match that decision. OpenClaw also owns the per-install-root coordination lock. Package managers protect their own install transaction, but they do not serialize OpenClaw’s manifest writes, isolated-stage copy/rename, final validation, or plugin import against another Gateway, doctor, or CLI process touching the same runtime dependency root.

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Effective plugin plan

The effective plugin plan is derived from config plus discovered plugin metadata. These inputs can activate bundled plugin runtime dependencies:
  • plugins.entries.<id>.enabled
  • plugins.allow, plugins.deny, and plugins.enabled
  • legacy channel config such as channels.telegram.enabled
  • configured providers, models, or CLI backend references that require a plugin
  • bundled manifest defaults such as enabledByDefault
  • the installed plugin index and bundled manifest metadata
Explicit disablement wins. A disabled plugin, denied plugin id, disabled plugin system, or disabled channel does not trigger runtime dependency repair. Persisted auth state alone also does not activate a bundled channel or provider. The plugin plan is the stable input. The generated dependency materialization is an output of that plan.

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Startup flow

Gateway startup parses config and builds the startup plugin lookup table before plugin runtime modules are loaded. Startup then stages runtime dependencies only for the startupPluginIds selected by that plan. For packaged installs, dependency staging is allowed before plugin import. After staging, the runtime loader imports startup plugins with install repair disabled; at that point missing dependency materialization is treated as a load failure, not another repair loop. When startup dependency staging is deferred behind the HTTP bind, Gateway readiness stays blocked on the plugin-runtime-deps reason until the selected startup plugin dependencies are materialized and the startup plugin runtime has loaded.

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When repair runs

Runtime dependency repair should run when one of these is true:
  • the effective plugin plan changed and adds bundled plugins that need runtime dependencies
  • the generated dependency manifest no longer matches the effective plan
  • expected installed package sentinels are missing or incomplete
  • openclaw doctor --fix or openclaw plugins deps --repair was requested
Runtime dependency repair should not run just because OpenClaw started. A normal startup with an unchanged plan and complete dependency materialization should skip package-manager work. Commands that edit config, enable plugins, or repair doctor findings can enter plugin plan mode once, materialize the newly required bundled dependencies, then return to the normal command flow. Local openclaw onboard and openclaw configure do this automatically after they successfully write config, so the next Gateway run does not discover missing bundled plugin packages after startup has already begun. Remote onboarding/configure stays read-only for local runtime deps.

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Hot reload rule

Hot reload paths that can change active plugins must go back through plugin plan mode before loading plugin runtime. The reload should compare the new effective plugin plan with the previous one, stage missing dependencies for newly active bundled plugins, then load or restart the affected runtime. If a config reload does not change the effective plugin plan, it should not repair bundled runtime dependencies.

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Package manager execution

OpenClaw writes a generated install manifest for the selected bundled runtime dependencies and runs the package manager in the runtime dependency install root. It prefers pnpm when available and falls back to the Node-bundled npm runner. The pnpm path uses production dependencies, disables lifecycle scripts, ignores the workspace, and keeps the store inside the install root: 
pnpm install \
  --prod \
  --ignore-scripts \
  --ignore-workspace \
  --config.frozen-lockfile=false \
  --config.minimum-release-age=0 \
  --config.store-dir=<install-root>/.openclaw-pnpm-store \
  --config.node-linker=hoisted \
  --config.virtual-store-dir=.pnpm
The npm fallback uses the safe npm install wrapper with production dependencies, lifecycle scripts disabled, workspace mode disabled, audit disabled, fund output disabled, legacy peer dependency behavior, and package-lock output enabled for the generated install root. After install, OpenClaw validates the staged dependency tree before making it visible to the runtime dependency root. Isolated staging is copied into the runtime dependency root and validated again. The whole repair/materialization section is guarded by an install-root lock. Current lock owners record PID, process start-time when available, and creation time. Legacy locks without process start-time or creation-time evidence are only reclaimed by filesystem age, so recycled Docker PID 1 locks recover without expiring normal long-running current installs by age alone.

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Install roots

Packaged installs must not mutate read-only package directories. OpenClaw can read dependency roots from packaged layers, but writes generated runtime dependencies to a writable stage such as:
  • OPENCLAW_PLUGIN_STAGE_DIR
  • $STATE_DIRECTORY
  • ~/.openclaw/plugin-runtime-deps
  • /var/lib/openclaw/plugin-runtime-deps in container-style installs
The writable root is the final materialization target. Older read-only roots are kept as compatibility layers only when needed. When a packaged OpenClaw update changes the versioned writable root but the selected bundled-plugin dependency plan is still satisfied by a previous staged root, repair reuses that previous node_modules tree instead of running the package manager again. The new versioned root still gets its own current package runtime mirror, so plugin code comes from the current OpenClaw package while unchanged dependency trees are shared across updates. Reuse skips previous roots with an active OpenClaw runtime-dependency lock, so a new root does not link to a dependency tree that another Gateway, doctor, or CLI process is currently repairing.

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Doctor and CLI commands

Use plugins deps to inspect or repair bundled plugin runtime dependency materialization: 
openclaw plugins deps
openclaw plugins deps --json
openclaw plugins deps --repair
openclaw plugins deps --prune
Use doctor when the dependency state is part of broader install health: 
openclaw doctor
openclaw doctor --fix
plugins deps and doctor operate on OpenClaw-owned bundled plugin runtime dependencies selected by the effective plugin plan. They are not third-party plugin install or update commands.

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Troubleshooting

If a packaged install reports missing bundled runtime dependencies:
  1. Run openclaw plugins deps --json to inspect the selected plan and missing packages.
  2. Run openclaw plugins deps --repair or openclaw doctor --fix to repair the writable dependency stage.
  3. If the install root is read-only, set OPENCLAW_PLUGIN_STAGE_DIR to a writable path and rerun repair.
  4. Restart Gateway after repair if the missing dependency blocked startup plugin loading.
In source checkouts, the workspace install usually provides bundled plugin dependencies. Run pnpm install for source dependency repair instead of using packaged runtime dependency repair as the first step.