Is OpenClaw Down?

Quickest ways to check the current status of openclaw.ai plus recent known issues and working alternatives if it's out.

Last editorial review: 2026-04-17

How to check right now

Known issues we've tracked

SECURITY CRISIS -- 9 CVEs disclosed over 4 days in March 2026, including one rated CVSS 9.9 (critical). Security researchers found 135,000+ OpenClaw instances publicly exposed on the internet across 82 countries, many with default credentials or unpatched versions. Mass developer migration to Hermes Agent reported across r/LocalLLaMA and Hacker News. If you are running OpenClaw, verify you are on the latest patch release and behind a firewall before doing anything else
2026-03The New Stack, OpenClaw security advisories, Hacker News
Prompt injection via incoming messages or scraped web content can hijack the agent when it has credential access -- VirusTotal skill scanning partnership is one mitigation path but not a full solution. Pair with an allow-list of executable skills and never give the agent write-access credentials to production systems
2026-02OpenClaw blog / Wikipedia
Breaking config changes across rapid version bumps -- SOUL.md schema has shifted multiple times since the rename, older templates may not load. Downstream of the security disclosures, update cadence is now slower/more careful which reduces but doesn't eliminate this
2026-03GitHub Issues

Issues here are sourced from our editorial sweeps, not real-time telemetry. Newer issues may exist.

What to use if OpenClaw is down

Top AIToolTier-ranked alternatives in the same category, ordered by our overall score.

About OpenClaw

Tier B (7.6/10). Open-source personal AI agent you talk to through Signal, Telegram, Discord, or WhatsApp. WARNING: March 2026 disclosed 9 CVEs (including CVSS 9.9) with 135,000+ exposed public instances -- verify hardening before running anywhere sensitive