After I take into consideration what a real AI private assistant ought to seem like, I think about one thing autonomous, able to taking useful actions that result in outcomes I’d have aimed for myself, and is not a ache to speak with.
The autonomous AI assistant OpenClaw, that’s actually solely a textual content away, is getting scarily near that imaginative and prescient.
What began out as a technologist’s weekend interest has now garnered over 160,000 stars on GitHub. It runs regionally in your machine and communicates by messaging apps you’re already utilizing, and might just about pull off no matter you ask of it.
When you’re searching for one thing easy, polished and safe, you are 100% higher off sticking with established chatbots like ChatGPT or Gemini.
When you’ve heard of OpenClaw (or possibly even its Moltbook offshoot) however weren’t certain what the fuss is about, I’ve received you coated.
What’s OpenClaw?
Bear with me for a second, however I need to make sure you’re in control and have some background information that can come in useful later. It’s value taking a second to watch the evolution of OpenClaw’s identify.
Austrian developer Peter Steinberger initially constructed the software in late 2025 as a weekend experiment referred to as Warelay (quick for”WhatsApp Relay”), a easy bridge to let customers work together with AI by their current messaging apps. Because the venture grew, Steinberger rebranded it to “Clawdbot,” a play on Anthropic’s Claude AI mannequin with a lobster as its mascot.
That did not final lengthy. Anthropic reached out with considerations about trademark confusion, and Steinberger settled on “Moltbot,” a reference to lobsters shedding their shells.
However the identify by no means fairly caught with customers, and by late January 2026, the venture underwent its closing metamorphosis into “OpenClaw”. The brand new identify has reportedly additionally been okayed by OpenAI, hopefully placing an finish to the confusion.
What OpenClaw truly does
The assistant runs completely by yourself {hardware}, whether or not that is a laptop computer, a house server, or a digital non-public server within the cloud.
Basically, OpenClaw represents a distinct strategy to AI assistants like ChatGPT or Gemini.
Somewhat than visiting an internet site or downloading one more app, customers work together with OpenClaw by instruments they already use every day — WhatsApp, Telegram, Discord, Slack, iMessage, and over a dozen different messaging platforms.
You don’t go to OpenClaw. You DM it.
The assistant runs completely by yourself {hardware}, whether or not that is a laptop computer, a house server, or a digital non-public server within the cloud.
Need OpenClaw to test your calendar or reschedule a flight? It may possibly truly do it. Ship a textual content out of your telephone and OpenClaw will begin opening browsers, clicking buttons, accessing recordsdata, and executing instructions in your behalf. The system maintains persistent reminiscence throughout periods, remembering your preferences, previous conversations, and private context to make for an expertise that’s as near having an precise assistant because it will get.
OpenClaw is not tied to any single AI mannequin both. Customers can plug in their very own API keys for Claude, ChaGPT, Gemini, and even run native fashions.
There’s additionally a bunch of productiveness integrations you should use that stretch to Notion, Trello, GitHub, and e-mail purchasers. Good house fans can join Philips Hue lights, House Assistant hubs, and Spotify for multi-room audio management.
Why did OpenClaw blow up?
OpenClaw went viral as a result of its customers genuinely find it irresistible and discover it helpful.
Folks have been utilizing it to filter their emails, management their house home equipment, mixture knowledge from wearable gadgets, and schedule social media posts.
It’s additionally enjoyable to mess around with. One X person had his OpenClaw AI bot name native companies and uploaded the recordings.
The recordings of my OpenClaw AI bot calling native companies are WILD (and fairly humorous) pic.twitter.com/Ul7LmI5DNJFebruary 2, 2026
Secondly, as this stuff normally go, the hype elevated when folks with massive followings began speaking concerning the venture.
Syracuse College professor Shelly Palmer said: “OpenClaw works precisely as marketed”. search engine marketing professional Julian Goldie hailed it as “the brand new period of native AI.”
It additionally made it to mainstream media, with main U.S. and worldwide publications choosing up the story. So, the hype creates the hype.
Is there a hyperlink between OpenClaw and Moltbook?
What actually added gasoline to the fireplace was the beginning of a brand new social community.
Nonetheless with me after OpenClaw’s winding naming historical past? Good — as a result of there’s yet another identify so as to add to the combo: Moltbook.
In what may be essentially the most surreal improvement of the OpenClaw saga, Y Combinator alum Matt Schlicht configured his OpenClaw bot, an agent he named Clawd Clawderberg, to construct Moltbook, a social community designed completely for AI brokers. The Reddit-like platform permits OpenClaw cases to create profiles, submit updates, and work together with different synthetic personalities.
So similar to we flocked to Mark Zuckerberg’s Fb a few years in the past, OpenClaw bots are heading to Clawderberg’s Moltbook en masse (1.6 million bots on the time of writing) and speaking about matters starting from enterprise to faith — and in some instances, even organising their very own.
On X, Elon Musk — by no means shy about getting concerned in stuff like this — claimed we’re at “the very early phases of the singularity”.
Simply the very early phases of the singularity. We’re at present utilizing a lot lower than a billionth of the ability of our Solar. https://t.co/k332z1ip7tJanuary 31, 2026
Must you attempt OpenClaw?
Right here’s the place issues get barely extra sophisticated.
For all its promise, OpenClaw has safety specialists deeply frightened. Cisco‘s risk and safety analysis staff printed an evaluation in late January that was fairly blunt: whereas acknowledging OpenClaw’s capabilities as “groundbreaking” from a function perspective, they warned that “from a safety perspective, it is an absolute nightmare.”
The considerations are actual and vital. OpenClaw can run shell instructions, learn and write recordsdata, and execute scripts in your machine — capabilities that grow to be harmful when misconfigured or when customers set up group expertise containing malicious code.
OpenClaw requires administrative privileges to run instructions, set up purposes, and modify recordsdata. In case your bot begins choosing up hidden, rogue prompts (this is named immediate injection), there’s probably not such a factor as a break that will get triggered or a warning gentle that begins flashing, telling you one thing is off.
From a safety perspective, it is an absolute nightmare.
Amy Chang, Chief, Menace & Safety Analysis AI Software program & Platform at Cisco
Researchers have already documented cases of uncovered API keys, leaked e-mail addresses, and internet-facing management panels that gave attackers full entry to customers’ techniques. A few of this knowledge was discovered hidden in plain sight in plain textual content recordsdata, making it susceptible to extraction.
Creator Steinberger himself admitted in a blog “this venture has grown far past what I may keep alone.”
When you’d nonetheless prefer to make the leap and discover OpenClaw contemplate operating it in a sandbox, far-off from any of your delicate private or work knowledge. That features your essential messaging accounts.
The venture did, nonetheless, do job of capturing the creativeness of the AI group and raised hopes that creating a very autonomous and safe AI private assistant is inside attain.
It additionally raises attention-grabbing questions on the place AI is heading. As an illustration, if customers can run surprisingly highly effective AI brokers on previous {hardware} mendacity of their basement (no, you don’t must rush out and purchase a Mac mini to run OpenClaw) do firms like OpenAI actually need to pour billions into constructing what rumors suggest could be five new AI-specific devices?
Everybody’s operating @openclaw on Mac Minis and cloud VMs. @WesRoth simply purchased a brand new mini PC for it.I am operating it on a 13-year-old HP laptop computer with Ubuntu.It designed my whole Kickstarter go-to-market technique, manages my PR pipeline, and changed what would’ve been a 5-person… pic.twitter.com/acJZHXQcMAFebruary 4, 2026
OpenClaw is value texting in the event you’ve received a listing of repetitive, low-risk duties and an previous desktop gathering mud, simply don’t belief it farther than you possibly can throw the machine operating it.
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