OpenClaw
on Android

Battery Setup

If this phone is staying plugged in 24/7 as an AI agent, your battery will degrade fast unless you set a charge limit. 85% is the sweet spot — your phone stays usable but isn't held at peak voltage constantly.

Samsung (One UI 4+)

1. 01

   Settings → Battery and device care → Battery

2. 02

   Tap More battery settings

3. 03

   Enable Protect battery — this caps charging at 85%

Motorola / Stock Android

1. 01

   Settings → Battery → Adaptive preferences or Battery health

2. 02

   Enable Optimized charging or Charge limit

3. 03

   If no built-in option exists, leave it — don't worry about it. Running the phone at moderate temperatures matters more than the charge limit.

Expand RAM with Swap

OpenClaw + Ubuntu proot + Node.js 22 can push 1.2–1.8GB of RAM in active use. If your phone has 4GB or less, Android will start killing background processes to reclaim memory, which can take down your gateway mid-session. A swap file on internal storage acts as overflow RAM — slower than real RAM, but enough to keep things alive.

SWAP — No ROOT (Play Store)

No root required, works on most Android phones. Search "SWAP No ROOT" by AllaKore on the Play Store.

1. 01

   Install SWAP — No ROOT by AllaKore from the Play Store.

2. 02

   Open the app → tap Create SWAP file.

3. 03

   Set the size. 2GB is the recommended starting point for a dedicated agent phone. Don't exceed 50% of your free internal storage — you need space for Ubuntu and OpenClaw files.

4. 04

   Tap Activate. The swap file is created on internal storage.

5. 05

   Enable "Activate on boot" in the app so swap persists through reboots.

Verify swap is active inside Ubuntu

# Should show your swap file and its size
cat /proc/swaps
free -h

If /proc/swaps shows a swap entry, it's working. free -h will show a Swap: row with your allocated size next to it.

Keep it Cool

Heat is your biggest enemy for 24/7 operation. When the processor gets hot, Android's thermal governor cuts clock speeds — sometimes by 50% or more. This is why npm installs take longer than expected, and why a "faster" phone can finish tasks slower than an older one. Keeping the phone cool is the single most impactful hardware optimization you can make.

Physical setup

1. 01

   Remove the case. Phone cases trap heat. Running caseless can drop surface temps by 5–10°C.

2. 02

   Stand the phone upright or prop it on its side. Flat on a surface traps heat underneath.

3. 03

   Point a small USB fan at it. Even a cheap desk fan dramatically improves sustained CPU performance. This is the most effective and cheapest hardware upgrade for a phone server.

4. 04

   Don't stack both phones together — they'll heat each other. Keep at least 10cm between them.

5. 05

   Don't put them inside a drawer, cabinet, or any enclosed space.

Software tweaks

1. 01

   Set screen timeout to minimum (15 or 30 seconds). The display is a significant heat source — keeping it off while the gateway runs lowers temps noticeably.

2. 02

   Set display refresh rate to 60Hz in Settings → Display. 90/120Hz increases GPU and CPU load even when you're not actively looking at the screen.

3. 03

   Lower brightness to minimum when not using the phone actively.

4. 04

   On Samsung: Settings → Developer options → Rendering → Disable HW overlays — reduces GPU workload slightly.

PC Control via scrcpy

If you have a PC, use scrcpy to control your phone from your desktop. This is strongly recommended for the installation process — you can paste long commands from your PC clipboard directly into Termux without typing everything on the phone screen.

Connect your phone

Enable USB Debugging on your phone: Settings → About phone → tap Build number 7 times → Developer options → USB debugging ON. Then plug in via USB and run:

# Single phone
scrcpy.exe --prefer-text

# If you have multiple phones connected, specify by serial
scrcpy.exe -s YOUR_DEVICE_SERIAL --prefer-text

# Find serials if needed
adb devices

Pasting into the phone terminal

Permissions & Wake Lock

Android aggressively kills background apps to save battery. Without the right permissions, Termux and NordVPN get killed the moment the screen turns off — which kills your OpenClaw gateway and drops the Meshnet.

Battery optimization — must disable for both apps

1. 01

   Settings → Apps → Termux → Battery → Set to Unrestricted (Samsung) or Don't optimize (Moto/stock)

2. 02

   Do the same for NordVPN

3. 03

   On Samsung: also go to Settings → Device care → Battery → Background usage limits → make sure Termux is NOT in the sleeping apps list

Termux wake lock (keep CPU running)

Run this inside Termux once and it keeps your session alive even with the screen off:

termux-wake-lock

Install Termux

While you're in F-Droid, also install Termux:Boot for auto-start on reboot.

First run

# Update the package index first — always
pkg update && pkg upgrade -y

# Install proot-distro — this is the only thing we need from Termux pkg
pkg install proot-distro curl -y

# Lock the CPU awake
termux-wake-lock

Ubuntu proot

This is the most important decision in the entire guide: Ubuntu proot is not optional. Bare Termux uses Android's Bionic libc which is incompatible with how Node.js native modules compile. OpenClaw's core dependency (koffi) will fail to build every single time in bare Termux, no matter what flags you use.

# Download and install Ubuntu — takes a minute on first run
proot-distro install ubuntu

# Enter Ubuntu — run this every time you open Termux
proot-distro login ubuntu

Your prompt will change from $ to root@localhost:~#. Everything from this point forward runs inside Ubuntu unless stated otherwise.

# Update Ubuntu package lists
apt update && apt upgrade -y

# Install build tools and deps
apt install -y curl git build-essential tmux lsof nano

Node.js 22

Use the NodeSource installer to get Node.js 22 inside Ubuntu. Do not use apt install nodejs directly — the version in Ubuntu's default repos is too old and will break OpenClaw.

# Add NodeSource repo for Node 22
curl -fsSL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_22.x | bash -

# Install Node.js
apt install -y nodejs

# Verify — should show v22.x.x
node -v
npm -v

Install OpenClaw

# Install OpenClaw globally
npm install -g openclaw@latest

npm install -g openclaw@latest --ignore-scripts

# Verify install
openclaw --version

Android Network Fix

OpenClaw calls os.networkInterfaces() at startup. On Android/proot this call behaves oddly and can cause a crash or hang. A tiny script patches it before OpenClaw loads.

# Create the patch script
cat <<'EOF' > /root/hijack.js
const os = require('os');
os.networkInterfaces = () => ({});
EOF

# Load it automatically on every session + fix tmp path
cat >> ~/.bashrc <<'EOF'
export NODE_OPTIONS="-r /root/hijack.js"
export TMPDIR=/tmp
EOF

source ~/.bashrc

Onboarding Wizard

Run the setup wizard once. This configures your API key, port, and initial settings. You won't need to run it again after this.

openclaw onboard

Wizard answers

{
  "channels": {
    "telegram": {
      "enabled": true,
      "botToken": "YOUR_BOT_TOKEN_FROM_BOTFATHER",
      "dmPolicy": "pairing"
    }
  }
}

Running the Gateway

The gateway is what keeps OpenClaw alive. Run it inside a tmux session so it stays running when you close the Termux window or the screen turns off.

# Start a named tmux session
tmux new -s openclaw

# Inside tmux, start the gateway
openclaw gateway --verbose

# ─────────────────────────────────────────────────
# To DETACH (leave gateway running): Ctrl+B, then D
# To REATTACH later:
tmux attach -t openclaw

When the gateway is running you'll see log lines like [gateway] listening on ws://0.0.0.0:18789. That means it's working.

Killing and restarting

You cannot use openclaw gateway restart — systemd isn't available in proot and it fails. Kill by PID instead:

# Find what's running on your port
lsof -i :18789

# Kill by PID from above output
kill <PID>

# Or kill by name
pkill -f "openclaw gateway"

Reconnecting after phone reboot

# In Termux
proot-distro login ubuntu

# In Ubuntu
tmux attach -t openclaw

# If session is gone, start fresh
tmux new -s openclaw
openclaw gateway --verbose

NordVPN Meshnet

1. 01

   Install NordVPN from the Google Play Store on your phone.

2. 02

   Sign in. Go to Products → Meshnet and toggle it ON. This feature is free — you don't need a paid VPN subscription.

3. 03

   Your phone gets a stable Meshnet IP in the 100.64.x.x range. Find it in the Meshnet screen.

4. 04

   Add other devices by linking them to your Nord account, or using the invite system.

5. 05

   Grant "Local network access" to each peer in the Meshnet devices list.

6. 06

   Disable "Local network discovery" in NordVPN settings. This sounds counterintuitive but it's required for cross-device Meshnet connections to work reliably.

Once Meshnet is active, your OpenClaw gateway is reachable at your Meshnet IP — but only as HTTP. To access the dashboard remotely you need HTTPS, which is the next step.

nginx HTTPS Proxy

Browsers block device identity APIs on plain HTTP connections. To access the OpenClaw dashboard from another device via Meshnet, you need HTTPS. nginx provides a self-signed HTTPS proxy in front of OpenClaw, bound specifically to the Meshnet interface.

Step 1 — Install nginx and generate a certificate

# Install nginx and openssl
apt install -y nginx openssl

# Remove the default site (it tries to bind port 80 which proot blocks)
rm /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default

# Create cert directory and generate self-signed certificate
mkdir -p /etc/nginx/certs
openssl req -x509 -nodes -days 365 -newkey rsa:2048 \
  -keyout /etc/nginx/certs/openclaw.key \
  -out /etc/nginx/certs/openclaw.crt \
  -subj "/CN=openclaw"

Step 2 — Create the nginx config

Use nano to type this directly — do not try to paste it via scrcpy as long multiline pastes get truncated. Replace YOUR_MESHNET_IP with your actual Meshnet IP (e.g. 100.69.xxx.xxx).

nano /etc/nginx/sites-available/openclaw

server {
    listen YOUR_MESHNET_IP:8443 ssl;
    ssl_certificate /etc/nginx/certs/openclaw.crt;
    ssl_certificate_key /etc/nginx/certs/openclaw.key;
    location / {
        proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:18789;
        proxy_http_version 1.1;
        proxy_set_header Upgrade $http_upgrade;
        proxy_set_header Connection upgrade;
        proxy_set_header Host $host;
    }
}

Save with Ctrl+X, Y, Enter.

Step 3 — Enable and start nginx

ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/openclaw /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/
nginx -t && nginx

# If nginx is already running from a previous attempt, reload instead:
nginx -s reload

Dashboard Access

Step 1 — Allow token auth and set origins

Detach from tmux first (Ctrl+B, D), then run:

# Allow token-based login over HTTPS
openclaw config set gateway.controlUi.allowInsecureAuth true

# Allow requests from your Meshnet HTTPS address
openclaw config set gateway.controlUi.allowedOrigins \
  '["https://YOUR_MESHNET_IP:8443"]'

# Get your auth token
openclaw config get gateway.auth.token

# Verify the setting saved
cat ~/.openclaw/openclaw.json | grep -i insecure

Step 2 — Restart the gateway to apply settings

pkill -f "openclaw gateway"
tmux attach -t openclaw
openclaw gateway --verbose

# Detach again: Ctrl+B, D

Step 3 — Access the dashboard

Open a browser on any Meshnet-linked device and go to:

https://YOUR_MESHNET_IP:8443/#token=YOUR_TOKEN_HERE

Accept the self-signed certificate warning (tap Advanced → Proceed). The dashboard loads and you're in.

Step 4 — Approve device pairing

The first time you connect from a new browser, OpenClaw requires pairing approval. Visit the dashboard URL, then immediately run:

# List pending device requests
openclaw devices list

# Approve (use the full ID from the list — no spaces)
openclaw devices approve <requestId>

Troubleshooting

Quick Commands

Daily startup sequence

# Enter Ubuntu
proot-distro login ubuntu

# Reattach to running gateway
tmux attach -t openclaw

# If gateway died, restart it
tmux new -s openclaw
openclaw gateway --verbose

# Detach and leave it running
# Ctrl+B, D

Config management

# View full config
cat ~/.openclaw/openclaw.json

# Get a specific value
openclaw config get gateway.auth.token

# Set a value (detach from tmux first)
openclaw config set gateway.controlUi.allowInsecureAuth true

# Check what port the gateway is on
openclaw config get gateway.port

Killing gateway cleanly

# Find running gateway
lsof -i :18789

# Kill by PID
kill <PID>

# Or kill by process name
pkill -f "openclaw gateway"

nginx management

# Reload config (use this after editing nginx config)
nginx -s reload

# Test config before applying
nginx -t

# Start fresh (only if nginx isn't running)
nginx

Dashboard URL format

# Via Meshnet HTTPS (from another device)
https://YOUR_MESHNET_IP:8443/#token=YOUR_TOKEN

# Locally on the same phone (no HTTPS needed)
http://localhost:18789/#token=YOUR_TOKEN

# Chat endpoint (alternative to full dashboard)
https://YOUR_MESHNET_IP:8443/chat?session=main

scrcpy launch commands (PC)

# Single device
scrcpy.exe --prefer-text

# Specific device by serial
scrcpy.exe -s YOUR_DEVICE_SERIAL --prefer-text

# Find device serials
adb devices

# Once scrcpy window is open, to paste from PC clipboard:
# Press Alt + Shift + V