openclaw/docs/install/backups.md

summary, read_when, title

summary	read_when	title
Back up OpenClaw state: archives, per-database snapshots, scheduling, offsite copies, and continuous replication	You want a backup routine for an OpenClaw install instead of a one-off archive You want scheduled, offsite, or continuous backups without copying the whole database every time You need to restore OpenClaw state from a backup	Backups

Backups

OpenClaw keeps its authoritative state in SQLite: one global control-plane database under the state directory (usually ~/.openclaw), plus one database per configured agent at <agentDir>/openclaw-agent.sqlite. Agent directories default to locations under the state directory but can be configured outside it. See Database schemas for the exact layout. This guide covers protecting that state: one-off archives, per-database snapshots, scheduling, offsite copies, and continuous replication for installs that should not re-upload whole databases on every backup.

Never copy live .sqlite, -wal, -shm, or -journal files as a backup. The databases are written while the Gateway runs, and raw file copies of a live database can be torn or corrupt. Every supported path below captures committed state safely.

Backups contain auth profiles, channel and provider credentials, session history, and other sensitive records. Store them encrypted, restrict the destination like you restrict the live state directory, and rotate credentials if you suspect a backup leaked. See [Migrating between machines](/install/migrating) for the same rules applied to machine moves.

Choose a path

• One-off, everything, portable: openclaw backup create archive.
• One database, compact and verified: openclaw backup sqlite create.
• Versioned and incremental by content: openclaw backup git create.
• Regular protection: provision the Gateway-owned backup automation.
• Continuous, incremental, seconds of data loss: replicate the databases with Litestream.
• Periodic incremental pull to another machine, no object storage: sqlite3_rsync.

Full archives

openclaw backup create --output ~/Backups/openclaw --verify

This writes a timestamped .tar.gz covering state, config, credentials, every configured agent directory, and (by default) workspaces, then validates the archive manifest and payload. Agent directories remain included when --no-include-workspace is set, even if their configured locations are outside the state directory. OpenClaw-owned SQLite databases, including agent databases inside workspace or managed-state assets, are captured with SQLite's online backup API, owner-verified, sanitized, and compacted. Other SQLite files in workspaces remain ordinary workspace files. Backup CLI documents every flag, owner-declared regenerable resources, volatile files, and verification details.

If the configuration is malformed, --no-include-workspace can still produce a partial recovery archive for state, config, and credentials. Its skipped diagnostics identify agent and plugin ownership that could not be resolved; repair the configuration before relying on an archive as complete.

Archives are full copies: each run re-uploads everything. They are the right tool before an update, reset, uninstall, or machine move, and a reasonable daily routine for small installs. For large workspaces or frequent backups, prefer snapshots or continuous replication below.

On ephemeral container hosts, keep the archive outside the container and use openclaw backup restore as the disaster-recovery primitive for rebuilding a fresh persistent state tree. Restore stages files only; activation remains an explicit offline deployment step.

Per-database snapshots

openclaw backup sqlite create --global --repository ~/Backups/openclaw-sqlite
openclaw backup sqlite create --agent main --repository ~/Backups/openclaw-sqlite

Each run publishes one verified snapshot directory (manifest.json plus database.sqlite) into the repository directory. Snapshots are vacuumed, so deleted-page remnants do not inflate them, and every snapshot records a SHA-256 that openclaw backup sqlite verify rechecks later.

--agent <id> resolves the database from that agent's configured agentDir, including roots outside the state directory. The same owner-derived lookup applies to explicit Git agent backups, --all, and scheduled Git backups. Verifying or restoring a historical artifact by agent id does not require that agent to exist in the current configuration.

Snapshot repositories are local directories. Scheduling, upload, retention, and restore-on-boot are intentionally left to the operator; the sections below cover them.

Schedule backups

The recommended schedule is one Gateway-owned automation. This example backs up the shared database and every configured agent database daily, including custom agent roots, and pushes the current branch to origin. Pushing requires the repository to have an origin remote first, so initialize it once before enabling a pushed schedule:

openclaw backup git init --repository ~/Backups/openclaw-git --remote git@github.com:you/openclaw-backups.git
openclaw backup enable --repository ~/Backups/openclaw-git --every 24h --push

backup enable --push refuses to schedule when no origin remote is configured, so a fresh install cannot silently create a schedule whose pushes always fail.

Pushed schedules redact credential-bearing tables by default: an unattended recurring push would otherwise retain credentials durably in remote Git history. Pass --include-secrets to schedule full-fidelity remote backups when you accept that tradeoff and the remote is private; restores from redacted history require re-pairing devices and re-authenticating providers afterward. Local (non-push) schedules keep full fidelity so restores are complete.

Use --global-only or --agent <id> to narrow the scope. Add --exclude-secrets for a redacted Git history. Re-running the command updates the fixed scheduled job instead of creating another one. Disable it with:

openclaw backup disable

The Gateway must be reachable while enabling or disabling the schedule. There is no local fallback scheduler.

As an alternative, use your platform scheduler directly. A nightly cron example that snapshots the control-plane database and the main agent database:

0 3 * * * openclaw backup sqlite create --global --repository "$HOME/Backups/openclaw-sqlite" --json >> "$HOME/Backups/openclaw-backup.log" 2>&1
5 3 * * * openclaw backup sqlite create --agent main --repository "$HOME/Backups/openclaw-sqlite" --json >> "$HOME/Backups/openclaw-backup.log" 2>&1

On macOS, a launchd job works the same way; on servers provisioned from the hosting guides, a systemd timer is the natural fit. --json emits one machine-readable result per run, so the log doubles as a backup audit trail. Prune old snapshot directories on your own retention schedule.

Every non-dry-run archive, local SQLite snapshot, and Git backup attempt is also recorded in the shared state database. openclaw status shows the newest attempt, and openclaw doctor suggests a one-off or scheduled backup when no successful run is recorded or the newest success is more than 14 days old.

Copy backups offsite

Archives and snapshot repositories are plain files, so any sync tool works. An rclone example targeting an S3-compatible bucket:

rclone sync ~/Backups/openclaw-sqlite remote:openclaw-backups/sqlite

Because every archive and local snapshot is a full copy, offsite syncs re-upload each new backup in full. Deduplicating backup tools such as restic reduce storage at the destination but still read full snapshots as input. When upload size per backup matters, use Git-backed snapshots or continuous replication.

Versioned backups to a Git repository

Git-backed backups dump each selected database into deterministic schema.sql, manifest.json, and per-table JSONL files, then create one commit for the whole run. Unchanged database content produces no commit, so Git stores and pushes only content changes by construction. OpenClaw stages only the backup-owned global and agents paths, not unrelated files elsewhere in the repository.

openclaw backup git init --repository ~/Backups/openclaw-git --remote <private-git-url>
openclaw backup git create --repository ~/Backups/openclaw-git --all --push
openclaw backup git log --repository ~/Backups/openclaw-git

Use a repository dedicated to OpenClaw backups. Existing global/ and agents/<agentId>/ scopes must be empty or contain a valid schema-version-1 OpenClaw backup manifest. OpenClaw refuses to replace any other scope, and an --all run validates every existing agent scope before deleting stale backup-owned entries.

The repository root must be owned by the current user and must not be group- or world-writable. This is checked during init and every create. On POSIX systems, confirm ownership and run chmod 700 <repository> to repair unsafe permissions.

The repository is ordinary Git and can use any remote, including GitHub. Keep the remote private: the default dump includes auth profiles, tokens, and other credential-bearing state. --exclude-secrets omits the documented secret tables when a redacted history is more useful than a credential-complete backup; see Backup CLI for the exact list.

Verify or restore one database at any commit without overwriting a live file:

openclaw backup git verify --repository ~/Backups/openclaw-git --ref <commit> --global
openclaw backup git restore --repository ~/Backups/openclaw-git --ref <commit> --agent main --target ./restored-agent.sqlite

Git restore converges derived search state: it rebuilds content-backed FTS5 indexes, leaves transcript projection state for Gateway startup reconciliation, and leaves vector tables for memory indexing to recreate. It then verifies table hashes, SQLite integrity, and foreign keys.

Continuous replication with Litestream

Litestream is an open-source replication daemon for SQLite. It runs alongside the Gateway with no OpenClaw changes: it watches each database's write-ahead log and streams incremental changes to object storage, with periodic snapshots so restores stay fast. Only changed pages leave the machine, which makes it the right tool when backups must not re-upload whole databases.

Litestream's one hard requirement is WAL mode, which OpenClaw uses on local filesystems; on network-backed storage such as NFS or SMB, OpenClaw falls back to rollback journaling, so verify with PRAGMA journal_mode; first. A minimal litestream.yml replicating the control-plane database and one agent database to an S3-compatible bucket:

dbs:
  - path: /home/user/.openclaw/state/openclaw.sqlite
    replicas:
      - url: s3://openclaw-backups/state
  - path: /home/user/.openclaw/agents/main/agent/openclaw-agent.sqlite
    replicas:
      - url: s3://openclaw-backups/agents/main

Run litestream replicate under your process supervisor, one entry per database you care about. To recover, restore to a fresh path and activate it offline:

litestream restore -o ./restored-openclaw.sqlite s3://openclaw-backups/state

For an agent with a custom agentDir, replace the example's default agent database path with its configured <agentDir>/openclaw-agent.sqlite.

Litestream replicates database bytes only. Config, credentials files, and workspaces still need one of the file-based paths above, and the replicated data is as sensitive as the archives, so apply the same bucket access and encryption rules.

Pull replication with sqlite3_rsync

sqlite3_rsync is the SQLite project's official replication tool, modeled on rsync: it compares page hashes between an origin and a replica database and ships only changed pages, typically over SSH with the same binary installed on both ends. Unlike a raw file copy, it takes a read transaction on the origin, so pulling from a live database while the Gateway runs produces a consistent replica. WAL mode is required on the origin. OpenClaw uses WAL on local filesystems but deliberately falls back to rollback journaling on network-backed storage such as NFS or SMB, so check the origin before relying on this path:

sqlite3 ~/.openclaw/state/openclaw.sqlite "PRAGMA journal_mode;"

If this prints anything other than wal, use one of the file-based paths above instead.

The tool ships in the sqlite-tools binary bundles on the SQLite download page and in the full source tree; package-manager SQLite builds often omit it. Pull a database to another machine you control:

sqlite3_rsync 'user@gateway-host:~/.openclaw/state/openclaw.sqlite' ./replica/openclaw.sqlite

Re-running the command is incremental: an unchanged database exchanges only a few kilobytes of hashes, and appended data transfers at roughly its own size. Treat the replica as read-only and as sensitive as the origin.

Two caveats. First, deltas are page-based, and OpenClaw's databases run incremental auto-vacuum on a periodic maintenance timer; a vacuum pass relocates pages, so a sync shortly after one (or after large deletions such as transcript-archive eviction) can transfer far more than the actual data change. Second, this replicates database bytes only, like Litestream: config, credentials files, and workspaces still need a file-based path above. For continuous replication with predictable upload size, prefer Litestream; use sqlite3_rsync for scheduled or ad-hoc pulls between machines without object storage. To recover, treat the replica like any restored database: copy it into place while the Gateway is stopped, then follow Restore a database.

Restore

Restore is deliberately explicit; nothing overwrites live state in place.

Restore a full archive

Start only from an archive you created or otherwise trust. openclaw backup verify checks archive structure and payload layout, but it does not authenticate the archive or make untrusted content safe.

Before a full restore, review What gets backed up. Then verify and extract into a fresh staging directory with one command:

ARCHIVE=./2026-03-09T08-00-00.000+08-00-openclaw-backup.tar.gz
openclaw backup restore "$ARCHIVE" --target ./restored-openclaw

The target must not exist or must be empty, and it must not be inside the live state directory or any configured live agent directory. OpenClaw verifies archive structure, the manifest, hardlinks, symbolic-link containment, and SQLite databases before it writes the target. A non-empty target is refused, and a failed extraction cleans its incomplete output. The command never writes into live state or agent roots and has no force or in-place mode. Treat the restored directory as sensitive: it can contain credentials, auth profiles, sessions, and workspace data.

Restoring an archive is time travel. Messaging-channel credentials with ratchet state, especially WhatsApp, may desynchronize after rollback and need relinking. Approvals and delivery/dedupe state also roll back, so review pending approvals before resuming the Gateway. Plugin `node_modules` trees are not archived; after activation, run `openclaw plugins update ` or reinstall with `openclaw plugins install --force`. Run `openclaw skills list` or start an agent session to regenerate the omitted `plugin-skills/` symlink index from current plugin metadata.

The schema-version-1 manifest records archiveRoot, the original paths under paths, an assets[] list, and additive configured-agent ownership metadata. Each asset includes its kind, original sourcePath, and archivePath inside the tarball. An external custom agent root has kind agent when it needs its own source; roots already covered by a state or workspace asset appear in ownership metadata without duplicating archive entries. Use the asset and ownership fields as the source of truth; do not derive the archive root from the archive filename or reconstruct agent paths from the default layout. Older archives without additive ownership metadata remain verifiable.

The archive layout is:

<archive-root>/manifest.json
<archive-root>/payload/posix/<absolute-source-path-without-leading-slash>/...
<archive-root>/payload/windows/<DRIVE>/<rest>/...
<archive-root>/payload/relative/<relative-source-path>/...

To activate, stop the Gateway and any node hosts that use the restored files. Make a fresh backup of current state or move it aside. Then move the extracted state asset into place, or point OPENCLAW_STATE_DIR at that asset. Restore every custom agent root using its recorded agent id and original source path; either preserve its configured agentDir or update that setting to its new location. On a new machine or under a different home directory, also use the manifest to map config, credentials, and workspace assets to their new paths. Run openclaw doctor before restarting the Gateway. See Updating for the rollback workflow.

Restore a database

For a snapshot, openclaw backup sqlite restore <snapshot-directory> --target <new-database-path> writes a re-verified database to a fresh target. For Git history, openclaw backup git restore --repository <dir> --ref <commit> (--global | --agent <id>) --target <new-database-path> materializes and verifies a fresh database. For Litestream, litestream restore writes a fresh database file. Move the result into place while the Gateway is stopped, then start the Gateway and check openclaw health and openclaw doctor.

After restoring onto a different OpenClaw version, preflight the database first with openclaw database preflight; see Database schemas.

Related

• Agent workspace for keeping workspace files in a private git repository
• Backup CLI reference
• Database schemas
• Migrating between machines
• Updating