Runway

OpenClaw ships a bundled runway provider for hosted video generation. The plugin is enabled by default and registers the runway provider against the videoGenerationProviders contract.

Property	Value
Provider id	runway
Plugin	bundled, enabledByDefault: true
Auth env vars	RUNWAYML_API_SECRET (canonical) or RUNWAY_API_KEY
Onboarding flag	--auth-choice runway-api-key
Direct CLI flag	--runway-api-key <key>
API	Runway task-based video generation (GET /v1/tasks/{id} polling)
Default model	runway/gen4.5

Getting started

1. Set the API key

   openclaw onboard --auth-choice runway-api-key

2. Set Runway as the default video provider

   openclaw config set agents.defaults.videoGenerationModel.primary "runway/gen4.5"

3. Generate a video

   Ask the agent to generate a video. Runway will be used automatically.

Supported modes and models

The provider exposes seven Runway models split across three modes. The same model id can serve more than one mode (for example gen4.5 works for both text-to-video and image-to-video).

Mode	Models	Reference input
Text-to-video	gen4.5 (default), veo3.1, veo3.1_fast, veo3	None
Image-to-video	gen4.5, gen4_turbo, gen3a_turbo, veo3.1, veo3.1_fast, veo3	1 local or remote image
Video-to-video	gen4_aleph	1 local or remote video

Local image and video references are supported via data URIs.

Aspect ratios	Allowed values
Text-to-video	16:9, 9:16
Image and video edits	1:1, 16:9, 9:16, 3:4, 4:3, 21:9

Warning

Video-to-video currently requires runway/gen4_aleph. Other Runway model ids reject video reference inputs.

Note

Picking a Runway model id from the wrong column produces an explicit error before the API request leaves OpenClaw. The provider validates model against the mode’s allowlist (TEXT_ONLY_MODELS, IMAGE_MODELS, VIDEO_MODELS) in extensions/runway/video-generation-provider.ts.

Configuration

{
  agents: {
    defaults: {
      videoGenerationModel: {
        primary: "runway/gen4.5",
      },
    },
  },
}

Advanced configuration

Environment variable aliases

OpenClaw recognizes both RUNWAYML_API_SECRET (canonical) and RUNWAY_API_KEY. Either variable will authenticate the Runway provider.

Task polling

Runway uses a task-based API. After submitting a generation request, OpenClaw polls GET /v1/tasks/{id} until the video is ready. No additional configuration is needed for the polling behavior.

Related

Video generation

Shared tool parameters, provider selection, and async behavior.

Configuration reference

Agent default settings including video generation model.