How to integrate Exa MCP with OpenClaw

Connect OpenClaw to Exa MCP. Summarize recent news articles on ai safety, find similar research papers to this url, and more using natural language, with authentication handled for you.

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Exa is a data extraction and search platform for gathering and analyzing information from websites, APIs, or databases. It helps teams quickly surface insights and automate data-driven workflows.

64 Tools

Introduction

OpenClaw is the fastest growing agent harness out there, which can work 24/7 to automate almost any kind of tasks. However, its capabilities are limited to the tools it has access to. Composio allows your OpenClaw to access Exa with authentication management handled for you. You can execute actions on Exa via your favorite OpenClaw interface (Telegram, WhatsApp, TUI, etc), whichever you prefer.

Also integrate Exa with

Why use Composio?

Apart from a managed and hosted MCP server, you will get:

  • Programmatic tool calling allows LLMs to write its code in a remote workbench to handle complex tool chaining. Reduces to-and-fro with LLMs for frequent tool calling.
  • Handling Large tool responses out of LLM context to minimize context rot.
  • Dynamic just-in-time access to 20,000 tools across 1500+ other Apps for cross-app workflows. It loads the tools you need, so LLMs aren't overwhelmed by tools you don't need.

How to install Exa with OpenClaw

Using Composio API Key and Setup Prompt

Copy the setup prompt from the OpenClaw dashboard
  • Run it in your OpenClaw chat interface.
  • Authenticate Exa from the dashboard
  • Go back to your OpenClaw interface and start asking questions.

Using OpenClaw/Composio Plugin

1. Install OpenClaw Composio plugin

bash
openclaw plugins install @composio/openclaw-plugin

2. Copy the API Key from dashboard.composio.dev

3. Setup OpenClaw Config

bash
openclaw config set plugins.entries.composio.config.consumerKey "ck_your_key_here"

4. Restart OpenClaw

bash
openclaw gateway restart

5. Go to your chat interface and start asking questions.

6. When prompted, authenticate the app and you're all set.

How It Works

The plugin connects to Composio's MCP server at https://connect.composio.dev/mcp and registers all available tools directly into the OpenClaw agent. Tools are called by name — no extra search or execute steps needed.

If a tool returns an auth error, the agent will prompt you to connect that toolkit at dashboard.composio.dev.

Configuration

bash
{
  "plugins": {
    "entries": {
      "composio": {
        "enabled": true,
        "config": {
          "consumerKey": "ck_your_key_here"
        }
      }
    }
  }
}
OptionDescriptionDefault
enabledEnable or disable the plugintrue
consumerKeyYour Composio consumer key (ck_...)—
mcpUrlMCP server URL (advanced)https://connect.composio.dev/mcp

What is the Exa MCP server, and what's possible with it?

The Exa MCP server is an implementation of the Model Context Protocol that connects your AI agent and assistants like Claude, Cursor, etc directly to your Exa account. It provides structured and secure access to Exa’s web search, content extraction, and research tools, so your agent can search the web, generate cited answers, retrieve website content, conduct in-depth research, and organize findings on your behalf.

  • Web search: Have your agent search the web with Exa to find relevant sources for a topic, question, company, or market.
  • Citation-backed answers: Ask the agent to answer specific questions or summarize broad topics using supporting web sources and citations.
  • Website content extraction: Direct your agent to retrieve text, highlights, summaries, and linked subpages from websites or saved documents.
  • Multi-step research: Let the agent start research tasks, check their progress, and return synthesized findings with citations when the work is complete.
  • Research collection management: Instruct your agent to create or delete web collections, import data into them, review imports, add enrichment, and set up monitors.

Conclusion

You've successfully integrated Exa with OpenClaw using Composio plugin. Now interact with Exa directly from your terminal, Web UI, or any messenger app using natural language commands.

Key benefits of this setup:

  • Seamless integration across TUI, Web UIs, and Messenger apps like Telegram, WhatsApp, Slack, etc.
  • Natural language commands for Exa operations
  • Managed authentication through Composio
  • Access to 20,000+ tools across 1500+ apps for cross-app workflows
  • Programmatic tool calling for complex tool chaining

Next steps:

  • Try asking OpenClaw to perform various Exa operations
  • Explore cross-app workflows by connecting more toolkits like Calendar, Slack, Notion, etc.
  • Build complex automation scripts that leverage OpenClaw's 24/7 running capabilities
TOOLS

Supported Tools

Every Exa action and event your agent gets out of the box.

Generate an answer

Generates a direct, citation-backed answer to a clear natural language question or topic using Exa's search, adept at both specific answers and detailed summaries for open-ended queries.

Batch Search Monitors

Delete, pause, or unpause one batch of matching Search API monitors, not Websets monitors.

Cancel Agent Run

Cancel a queued or running Agent run immediately without returning results.

Cancel Webset

Cancel all operations on a Webset, stopping searches and enrichments.

Cancel Webset Enrichment

Cancel a running Webset enrichment and return its updated state.

Cancel Webset Search

Cancel a running search in a Webset and return its updated state.

Create Agent Run

Start an asynchronous Exa Agent run for multi-step web research or enrichment.

Create API Key

Create an API key for the authenticated Exa team.

Create Import

Tool to create a new import to upload data into a Webset.

Create a Monitor

Tool to create a new Monitor.

Create Search Monitor

Create a Search API monitor that delivers new, deduplicated search results to a webhook.

Create Webhook

Create a webhook delivering selected events to your URL.

Create Webset

Tool to create a new Webset with search, import, and enrichment setup.

Create Webset Enrichment

Create an enrichment task for items in an existing Webset.

Create Webset Search

Create a search for an existing Webset and return its initial state.

Delete Agent Run

Delete a stored Exa Agent run by ID and return its deletion receipt.

Delete API Key

Delete an API key belonging to the authenticated team using a Team Management service key.

Delete import

Tool to delete an existing import.

Delete Search Monitor

Permanently delete a Search API monitor and return the deleted monitor.

Delete Webhook

Delete a webhook, making its status inactive and stopping future deliveries to its URL.

Delete webset

Tool to delete a Webset.

Delete Webset Enrichment

Delete a Webset enrichment and return the deleted enrichment.

Delete Webset Item

Delete an item from a Webset and return the deleted item.

Delete Websets Monitor

Delete a Websets monitor and return the deleted monitor.

Get Agent Run

Retrieve an Agent run to inspect its status, output, citations, usage, or cost.

Get API Key

Tool to retrieve details of a specific API key by its ID.

Get API Key Usage

Get an Exa API key's total cost and cost breakdown for a time period.

Get contents from URLs or document IDs

Retrieve text / highlights / summary / subpages from URLs.

Get Event

Tool to get details of a specific event by its ID.

Get Import

Retrieve an import by ID to inspect its status, entity count, and failure details.

Get Search Monitor

Retrieve a Search API monitor's configuration, status, and next scheduled run by ID.

Get Search Monitor Run

Retrieve a Search API monitor run's status and full output when completed.

Get Webhook

Retrieve a webhook's status, events, destination URL, and metadata by ID.

Get Webset

Retrieve a Webset by ID or external ID, including its status and operations.

Get Webset Enrichment

Retrieve an enrichment configured on a Webset, including its status, description, format, and options.

Get Webset Item

Retrieve a Webset item by ID, including its properties, evaluations, and enrichments.

Get Webset Search

Retrieve a Webset search by ID to inspect its status, progress, and recall metrics.

Get Websets Monitor

Retrieve a Websets monitor's status, schedule, search behavior, and last run.

Get Websets Monitor Run

Retrieve a Websets monitor run's status, type, timestamps, and failure reason.

Get Websets Team Info

Get the authenticated Websets team's identity, current concurrency usage, and limits.

List Agent Run Events

List one page of stored Exa Agent run events as JSON, with cursor pagination.

List Agent Runs

List one page of your team's Exa Agent runs, ordered newest to oldest.

List API Keys

List the authenticated Exa team's API keys, or retrieve one by API key ID.

List events

Tool to list all events that have occurred in the system.

List imports

List Websets imports with cursor-based pagination to inspect import jobs.

List Search Monitor Runs

List one page of a Search API monitor's runs, newest first, including status and output.

List Search Monitors

List one page of the authenticated team's Search API monitors, not Websets monitors.

List Webhook Attempts

List one page of a webhook's delivery attempts in descending order.

List webhooks

Tool to list all webhooks for Websets.

List Webset Items

List one page of a Webset's items, optionally filtered by source ID.

List Websets

List one page of Websets, optionally filtered by ID, external ID, or title.

List Websets Monitor Runs

List one page of runs for a Websets monitor, including status and timestamps.

List Websets Monitors

List one page of Websets monitors, optionally filtered by Webset ID.

Preview Webset

Preview how Exa interprets a search before creating a Webset.

Search

Search the web for ranked results with optional per-result text, highlights, or summaries.

Stop Agent Run

Complete a running ultra-effort Agent run early and return results gathered so far.

Trigger Search Monitor

Trigger an immediate Search API monitor run regardless of its schedule.

Update API Key

Update an API key's name, rate limit, or billing-period spending budget.

Update import

Tool to update an import configuration by ID.

Update Search Monitor

Update a Search API monitor's settings, pause or resume it, or remove its schedule with trigger=null.

Update Webhook

Update a webhook's destination URL, subscribed events, or metadata.

Update Webset

Update a Webset's title or metadata, leaving omitted fields unchanged.

Update Webset Enrichment

Update an enrichment's task, format, options, or metadata on a Webset.

Update Websets Monitor

Update a Websets monitor's status, schedule, search behavior, or metadata.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

With a standalone Exa MCP server, the agents and LLMs can only access a fixed set of Exa tools tied to that server. However, with the Composio Tool Router, agents can dynamically load tools from Exa and many other apps based on the task at hand, all through a single MCP endpoint.

Yes, you can. OpenClaw fully supports MCP integration. You get structured tool calling, message history handling, and model orchestration while Tool Router takes care of discovering and serving the right Exa tools.

Yes, absolutely. You can configure which Exa scopes and actions are allowed when connecting your account to Composio. You can also bring your own OAuth credentials or API configuration so you keep full control over what the agent can do.

All sensitive data such as tokens, keys, and configuration is fully encrypted at rest and in transit. Composio is SOC 2 Type 2 compliant and follows strict security practices so your Exa data and credentials are handled as safely as possible.

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