> For clean Markdown of any page, append .md to the page URL.
> For a complete documentation index, see https://docs.nvidia.com/nemoclaw/llms.txt.
> For AI client integration (Claude Code, Cursor, etc.), connect to the MCP server at https://docs.nvidia.com/nemoclaw/_mcp/server.

# Use OpenRouter

> Configure NemoClaw to route hosted inference through OpenRouter.

OpenRouter provides an OpenAI-compatible Chat Completions route for OpenClaw, Hermes, and LangChain Deep Agents Code.
NemoClaw keeps the sandbox on `https://inference.local/v1` and sends upstream traffic through a host adapter.

## Credential

Set `OPENROUTER_API_KEY` in the host shell before onboarding.
Valid OpenRouter keys begin with `sk-or-`.
NemoClaw validates that the key is non-empty and uses the expected prefix.

## Model Choices

OpenRouter uses the same catalog-backed picker and featured model list as NVIDIA Endpoints.
You can also enter any OpenRouter model ID manually.
NemoClaw validates manual entries with OpenRouter before continuing.

## Onboard

Run the onboarding wizard and select **OpenRouter**.

```bash
nemohermes onboard
```

NemoClaw registers the `openrouter-api` provider through the OpenShell `openai` profile.

## Host Adapter

NemoClaw starts or reuses a local host adapter on port `11437` by default.
It registers OpenShell with `OPENAI_BASE_URL=http://host.openshell.internal:11437/v1`.

The adapter accepts only the OpenShell bearer credential bound during setup and forwards requests to `https://openrouter.ai/api/v1`.
It adds the default `HTTP-Referer` and `X-OpenRouter-Title` attribution headers.
The adapter does not store the API key.

The adapter exposes a host health endpoint and writes logs to `~/.nemoclaw/openrouter-runtime-adapter.log`.
Set `NEMOCLAW_OPENROUTER_RUNTIME_ADAPTER_PORT` before onboarding to use a different host port.

## Validation

Host-side catalog, model, and smoke validation use `/v1/chat/completions` only.
NemoClaw skips the Responses API probe and uses managed Chat Completions at runtime.

## Related Topics

* [About Inference Routing](../about-inference-routing) explains why the sandbox does not call the adapter directly.
* [Understand Provider Validation](../validate-inference/understand-provider-validation) describes provider validation behavior.