Hugging Face (inference)

Hugging Face Inference Providers offer OpenAI-compatible chat completions through a single router API. You get access to many models (DeepSeek, Llama, and more) with one token. OpenClaw uses the OpenAI-compatible endpoint (chat completions only); for text-to-image, embeddings, or speech use the HF inference clients directly.

• Provider:
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  huggingface
• Auth:
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  HUGGINGFACE_HUB_TOKEN
  or
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  HF_TOKEN
  (fine-grained token with Make calls to Inference Providers)
• API: OpenAI-compatible (
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  https://router.huggingface.co/v1
  )
• Billing: Single HF token; pricing follows provider rates with a free tier.

Getting started

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<Warning>
  The token must have the **Make calls to Inference Providers** permission enabled or API requests will be rejected.
</Warning>

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```bash}
openclaw onboard --auth-choice huggingface-api-key
```

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You can also set or change the default model later in config:

```json5}
{
  agents: {
    defaults: {
      model: { primary: "huggingface/deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-R1" },
    },
  },
}
```

Non-interactive setup

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openclaw onboard --non-interactive \
  --mode local \
  --auth-choice huggingface-api-key \
  --huggingface-api-key "$HF_TOKEN"

This will set

Model IDs

Model refs use the form

Advanced configuration

Related