Choosing the Best LLMs for OpenClaw in 2026

BYOM: OpenClaw supports multiple providers—see overview for setup links.

Comparison matrix (operator view)

Provider	Strengths for OpenClaw	Watch-outs
Claude (Anthropic)	Long context, strong tool-use, good instruction following	Higher cost at scale — Anthropic setup
GPT (OpenAI)	Broad ecosystem, fast variants for triage	Policy changes; set spend caps — OpenAI setup
Gemini (Google)	Competitive pricing, multimodal	Verify tool schemas — Google setup
DeepSeek	Cost-efficient reasoning	Latency/regions — DeepSeek setup
Ollama (local)	Privacy, flat cost	Hardware limits — local guide

Recommended stacks by use case

Personal assistant: Claude or GPT main model + local summarizer.
DevOps agent: High-context Claude/GPT + strict sandbox.
High-volume triage: Small/fast cloud model + escalation model.
Offline home lab: Ollama primary with optional cloud fallback.

Example multi-model config

# Illustrative routing — adapt to your schema
models:
  default: anthropic/claude-sonnet
  fast: openai/gpt-4o-mini
  local: ollama/llama3.2
routing:
  summarize: local
  toolHeavy: default
  fallback: fast

Tune costs via cost optimization playbook. Errors? See model troubleshooting.