# Show HN: OpenClawMachines – Extending OpenClaw to the Enterprise

> Source: <https://github.com/mathaix/OpenClawMachines>
> Published: 2026-07-13 17:45:29+00:00

**Run as many isolated OpenClaw agents as you need, on hardware you own.**

OpenClaw Machines is an **open-source platform for running
OpenClaw in secure AI sandboxes on your
own infrastructure**. A

**control plane** orchestrates your hosts, and each agent runs in its own

[Firecracker](https://github.com/firecracker-microvm/firecracker)microVM on them — hardware-isolated, safe for untrusted and agent-generated code. A

**Cloudflare data plane** is the front door: every machine gets its own subdomain behind edge auth, reached through a tunnel that terminates

*inside*the VM — no host port is exposed for user-to-VM traffic. The current control plane still needs private or firewall-restricted access to each agent's authenticated control API on

`9090`

. See it running at
[openclawmachines.com](https://openclawmachines.com).

The Apache-2.0 **public core** ships every piece of that stack:

- a
— Go API, Postgres-backed accounts, machines, and hosts;**minimal control plane**[placement](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/architecture.md#scheduling--capacity-management),[machine lifecycle](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/architecture.md#machine-lifecycle),[host enrollment](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/host-enrollment.md),[backups](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/architecture.md#backup--restore), and[durable workflows](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/architecture.md#durable-workflows-dbos); - the
(**host agent**`ocm-agent`

) — boots, supervises, and reaps Firecracker microVMs on your enrolled Linux boxes, managing bridge/TAP networking and rootfs staging; - a per-host
(LiteLLM) — one place for model keys and BYO-key support, with per-machine usage tracking across providers (or your own locally served models);**LLM proxy** - the
— the in-VM pieces: auth proxy, web-chat gateway, live terminal, and the artifact-driven runtime staging/upgrade flow;**OpenClaw runtime** - the
— paired Chromium browser VMs with CDP routing and a watchable live view;**browser runtime** — GitHub, Google Workspace, OpenAPI, GraphQL, and remote-MCP tools connected once per workspace and exposed to machines through the OCM MCP facade;**workspace integrations / native MCP**- and the
that assemble it all — every component's build command, the GCS artifact bucket layout, host provisioning scripts, and the**build pipelines**[release lanes](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/ci-release.md).

The `ocm`

CLI lives in the separate
[ mathaix/ocm-cli](https://github.com/mathaix/ocm-cli) Apache-2.0 repository.

Click the screenshot to watch the 43-second demo on YouTube. This is a linked image, not an embedded player.

The demo covers host onboarding, agent spin-up, the running Firecracker VM terminal, workspace MCP integrations, and an agent tool call end to end.

**Security.** Real isolation, not containers: one Firecracker microVM per agent, with its own guest kernel behind a KVM hardware boundary — and auth enforced at the edge and again inside every VM.**Cost.** One flat server cost: rent a single bare-metal box and run as many hardware-isolated agents as it fits — see[how the options compare](#how-the-options-compare). The same architecture cuts token spend too: route agents to open-source models running on your own GPU hardware instead of paying per-token APIs.**Sovereignty.** Your hardware, your data, your keys. Run the control plane and workers on machines you own, and route model traffic through the per-host LLM proxy to any provider — or to models served on your own GPUs.**Open source.** Apache-2.0 public core and companion, permissively licensed for adoption, embedding, and contribution.`ocm`

CLI**Enterprise.** Multi-user accounts and teams, admin-gated host management, encrypted per-machine secrets, and capacity/placement policies across your fleet.**Ecosystem.** Browser VMs for web automation, live terminal and web chat, per-VM routing, workspace-scoped native MCP integrations, backups/snapshots, agent memory, and observability with OpenTelemetry/Opik tracing and per-machine usage tracking.

If you run [OpenClaw](https://github.com/openclaw/openclaw) today, you have a
few options:

**Local hardware**— run it on your own laptop or desktop.** A VPS**(e.g. Hostinger, DigitalOcean) — rent a virtual server and run it there.** A managed service**(e.g. KiloClaw) — spin up a hosted OpenClaw instance and pay per instance.

OpenClaw Machines is the **fourth option**: rent **one bare-metal server**
(OVHcloud, Hetzner, …), point OpenClaw Machines at it, and spin up as many
**hardware-isolated** OpenClaw instances as the box will hold. One agent or
fifty — **the cost stays one flat server**.

In short: the **managed** route is easiest but priced per agent; **local** and
**VPS** are cheap to start but don't isolate or scale well. **OpenClaw Machines**
trades a little more setup for the best economics and isolation once you're
running more than a couple of agents — one server, many hardware-isolated agents,
all yours.

OpenClaw Machines turns your own Linux servers into a pool of secure, on-demand
sandboxes. Each sandbox is a real Firecracker microVM (its own kernel,
hardware-isolated via KVM) that runs one AI agent. The platform is the **control
plane** that creates those VMs, keeps track of them, routes traffic to them, and
tears them down — so you can run many untrusted agents safely on infrastructure
you own. Think: a mini-cloud for AI agents, that you self-host.

**Control plane (Go backend) — the brain.** Accounts, machines, hosts, and config; the API the UI/CLI call; placement and lifecycle orchestration.**Hosts + worker agents — your Linux boxes.** Enroll a host with an install script; its worker agent boots and stops Firecracker microVMs when told to.**Machines — one isolated microVM per agent.** Inside: the OpenClaw agent, a web chat gateway, and a live terminal.**Browser VMs**— separate microVMs running headful Chromium with a live view, driven by the agent over CDP for browser automation.** Routing / data plane**— every running VM gets its own subdomain and a Cloudflare Tunnel that terminates** inside the VM**, with auth enforced at the edge and again in-VM.** Workspace integrations (native MCP)**— connect external tools once per workspace (GitHub, Google Workspace, or any OpenAPI / GraphQL / remote-MCP endpoint); the control plane exposes them to each machine's agent through a single built-in MCP server, so the agent discovers and calls them with`ocm.search_tools`

/`ocm.call_tool`

instead of per-integration wiring.

``` php
flowchart TB
    U["you — browser / ocm CLI"] --> EDGE["Cloudflare edge<br/>Access auth · Worker route lookup (KV)"]
    EDGE -->|dashboard / API| CP["Control plane (Go)<br/>accounts · machines · hosts<br/>placement · lifecycle · backups"]
    CP --- DB[("Postgres")]
    CP -->|enroll · heartbeat · boot/stop :9090| H1["Host 1 — your Linux box<br/>ocm-agent · LLM proxy · CDP proxy"]
    CP -->|…| HN["Host N"]
    EDGE -->|per-VM tunnel, terminates inside the VM| VM1
    subgraph H1X["Host 1's microVMs"]
        VM1["Machine — Firecracker microVM<br/>OpenClaw agent · web chat · terminal<br/>authproxy + cloudflared inside"]
        BVM["Browser VM<br/>headful Chromium · live view"]
        VM1 -->|CDP| BVM
    end
    H1 --- H1X
```

The full design — data plane, routing, tunnels, lifecycle, config, and the
build/release flow — is in ** docs/architecture.md**, and
the five-layer stack (React UI → Cloudflare edge → Go control plane → host
agents → Firecracker sandboxes) is in

**.**

[docs/tech-stack.md](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/tech-stack.md)OpenClaw Machines runs Firecracker microVMs, which require KVM. You need a KVM-enabled Linux host: bare metal, or a cloud VM with nested virtualization enabled. It does not run on macOS, Windows/WSL, or a standard cloud VM without nested virtualization.

Check your host:

```
make preflight
```

** The Getting Started guide** is three stages, each
ending with something working:

Using a coding agent?Point it at[and ask it to follow the guide from Stage 1.]`docs/getting-started.md`

**Local evaluation**— the full stack + a real Firecracker machine on one KVM-capable Linux box. No Cloudflare or public domain is required; use an existing KVM host or the optional GCP provisioning example.**Cloudflare + a dedicated host**— the production-shaped deployment: domain, tunnels, edge auth, and an enrolled cloud or bare-metal host.** The full workflow**— create and use machines (chat, terminal, browser VMs), lifecycle, backups, runtime upgrades.

— the three-stage guide above**Getting Started**— using a machine day-to-day (model, chat, terminal, browser VM, files, logs, traces, backups)** User guide**— connect GitHub, Google Workspace, OpenAPI, GraphQL, and remote-MCP tools once per workspace** Workspace integrations / native MCP**[Architecture](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/architecture.md)— data plane, routing, tunnels, lifecycle,[workspace integrations / native MCP](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/architecture.md#workspace-integrations--native-mcp)[Tech stack](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/tech-stack.md)— the five layers, client to sandbox[Local and BYO-host setup](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/local-setup.md)[Control plane deployment profiles](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/control-plane-profiles.md)[Self-hosted control plane prerequisites](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/self-hosted-control-plane.md)[LLM operator runbook](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/llms/self-hosted-setup.txt)[Public docs inventory](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/docs/public-docs-inventory.md)[Contributing](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/CONTRIBUTING.md)·[Security policy](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/SECURITY.md)·[Code of conduct](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md)`ocm`

CLI project

— questions, ideas, show & tell[GitHub Discussions](https://github.com/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/discussions)— bugs and feature requests[Issues](https://github.com/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/issues)— the open-source readiness tracker: what's done, what's next[Roadmap](https://github.com/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/issues/25)- Found a vulnerability? See the
[security policy](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/SECURITY.md).

See [CONTRIBUTING.md](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/CONTRIBUTING.md) and the
[code of conduct](/mathaix/OpenClawMachines/blob/main/CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md).