research-tool

# OpenClaw Research Tool

Web search for OpenClaw agents, powered by OpenRouter. Ask questions in natural language, get accurate answers with cited sources. Defaults to GPT-5.2 which excels at documentation lookups and citation-heavy research.

> **Note:** Even low-effort queries may take **1 minute or more** to complete. High/xhigh reasoning can take **10+ minutes** depending on complexity. This is normal — the model is searching the web, reading pages, and synthesizing an answer.
>
> **Recommended:** Run research-tool in a **sub-agent** so your main session stays responsive:
> ```
> sessions_spawn task:"research-tool 'your query here'"
> ```
>
> **⚠️ Never set a timeout on exec when running research-tool.** Queries routinely take 1-10+ minutes. Use `yieldMs` to background it, then poll — but do NOT set `timeout` or the process will be killed mid-search.

The `:online` model suffix gives any model **live web access** — it searches the web, reads pages, cites URLs, and synthesizes an answer.

## Install

```bash
cargo install openclaw-search-tool
```

Requires `OPENROUTER_API_KEY` env var. Get a key at https://openrouter.ai/keys

## Quick start

```bash
research-tool "What are the x.com API rate limits?"
research-tool "How do I set reasoning effort parameters on OpenRouter?"
```

### From an OpenClaw agent

```python
# Best: run in a sub-agent (main session stays responsive)
sessions_spawn task:"research-tool 'your query here'"

# Or via exec — NEVER set timeout, use yieldMs to background:
exec command:"research-tool 'your query'" yieldMs:5000
# then poll the session until complete
```

## Flags

### `--effort`, `-e` (default: `low`)

Controls how much the model reasons before answering. Higher effort means better analysis but slower and more tokens.

```bash
research-tool --effort low "What year was Rust 1.0 released?"
research-tool --effort medium "Explain how OpenRouter routes requests to different model providers"
research-tool --effort high "Compare tradeoffs b...