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Providers

Vercel AI gateway

The Vercel AI Gateway provides a unified API to access hundreds of models through a single endpoint.

Property Value
Provider vercel-ai-gateway
Package @openclaw/vercel-ai-gateway-provider
Auth AI_GATEWAY_API_KEY
API Anthropic Messages compatible
Base URL https://ai-gateway.vercel.sh
Model catalog Auto-discovered via /v1/models

Getting started

  • Install the plugin

    bash
    openclaw plugins install @openclaw/vercel-ai-gateway-provider

    Installation applies to a running Gateway automatically; otherwise it takes effect on the next startup. See Apply changes and inspect.

  • Set the API key

    bash
    openclaw onboard --auth-choice ai-gateway-api-key

  • Set a default model

    json5
    {  agents: {    defaults: {      model: { primary: "vercel-ai-gateway/anthropic/claude-opus-4.6" },    },  },}

  • Verify the model is available

    bash
    openclaw models list --provider vercel-ai-gateway

    • Non-interactive example

    bash
    openclaw onboard --non-interactive --accept-risk --skip-health \  --mode local \  --auth-choice ai-gateway-api-key \  --ai-gateway-api-key "$AI_GATEWAY_API_KEY"

    Model ID shorthand

    OpenClaw normalizes Claude shorthand model refs at runtime:

    Shorthand input Normalized model ref
    vercel-ai-gateway/claude-opus-4.6 vercel-ai-gateway/anthropic/claude-opus-4.6
    vercel-ai-gateway/opus-4.6 vercel-ai-gateway/anthropic/claude-opus-4-6

    Advanced configuration

    Environment variable for daemon processes

    If the OpenClaw Gateway runs as a daemon (launchd/systemd), make sure AI_GATEWAY_API_KEY is available to that process.

    Provider routing

    Vercel AI Gateway routes each request to the upstream provider named in the model ref prefix. For example, vercel-ai-gateway/anthropic/claude-opus-4.6 routes through Anthropic, vercel-ai-gateway/openai/gpt-5.5 routes through OpenAI, and vercel-ai-gateway/moonshotai/kimi-k2.6 routes through MoonshotAI. One AI_GATEWAY_API_KEY authenticates all upstream providers.

    Thinking levels

    /think options follow the upstream model prefix when OpenClaw recognizes it. vercel-ai-gateway/anthropic/... uses the Claude thinking profile, including the adaptive default for Claude 4.6 models. Trusted vercel-ai-gateway/openai/... refs (gpt-5.2 and newer, plus Codex variants down to gpt-5.1-codex) expose /think xhigh. Other namespaced refs keep the standard reasoning levels unless their catalog metadata declares more.

    App attribution

    Requests to ai-gateway.vercel.sh carry Vercel's documented app-attribution headers, HTTP-Referer: https://openclaw.ai and X-Title: OpenClaw. This also applies to custom provider ids whose baseUrl points at AI Gateway. A custom proxy baseUrl gets no attribution headers.

    Model selection

    Choosing providers, model refs, and failover behavior.
    Troubleshooting

    General troubleshooting and FAQ.
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