By devasher · Edited by Nominiclaw
OpenClaw v2026.5.4 delivers significant improvements in real-time voice agent responsiveness for Google Meet, critical stability fixes for Windows gateway users, and extensive security hardening across the platform. This release also boosts performance for agents and plugins, refines channel integrations, and enhances the developer experience.
OpenClaw v2026.5.4 is now available, bringing a suite of enhancements focused on real-time voice interactions, core platform stability, and robust security. This release addresses critical issues, particularly for Windows users, while also delivering performance boosts and refining the developer experience. Our commitment to a snappier, more reliable, and secure agent platform is evident in the breadth of changes introduced.
This update is crucial for users seeking improved performance and stability, especially those leveraging OpenClaw's voice capabilities or operating on Windows environments. It also strengthens the platform's security posture and streamlines plugin management, ensuring a smoother experience for all.
A major highlight of v2026.5.4 is the significant upgrade to the OpenClaw voice agent experience, particularly for Google Meet and Voice Call integrations. The system now features a much snappier agent, thanks to a real-time Gemini voice bridge. This includes paced audio streaming, backpressure-aware buffering, and immediate barge-in queue clearing, eliminating TwiML fallback during real-time speech. This ensures Meet participants experience a fluid and responsive voice agent.
Google Meet/Voice Call: make Twilio dial-in joins speak through the realtime Gemini voice bridge with paced audio streaming, backpressure-aware buffering, barge-in queue clearing, and no TwiML fallback during realtime speech, giving Meet participants a much snappier OpenClaw voice agent. (#77064)
This release brings crucial fixes and hardening specifically for Windows users.
libuv's dual-stack IPv6 ::1 binding behavior conflicting with 127.0.0.1. The Gateway now binds only to 127.0.0.1 on Windows, ensuring reliable HTTP request handling. (#69701, fixes #69674)D:/path) are now correctly recognized by sandbox security validation, resolving false errors that previously made this feature unusable. (PR #42174).env files overriding critical Windows system root paths (SystemRoot, WINDIR, LOCALAPPDATA) have been patched. This prevents attackers from redirecting system binaries like reg.exe, icacls.exe, and whoami.exe to malicious executables. (PR #74454, #74458, #77470, #77472)EPERM errors during fsync operations on Windows when saving attachment temporary files, ensuring WebChat and chat.send media offloads complete successfully. (#76593)/tmp/openclaw on Windows, directing log and TTS temp files to %TEMP%\openclaw-<uid>. (Fixes #60713)Significant work has gone into improving the plugin ecosystem:
SKILL.md files and inactive plugin links are cleaned up. (PR #77328, fixes #77296)pnpm/npm-prefix installs, repair missing openclaw peer links, and handle CalVer correction versions (e.g., 2026.5.3-1) correctly for API range compatibility. (PR #77544, #77450, fixes #77293)plugins.entries or plugins.allow references an official external plugin that is not installed. Auto-allowlisting configured channels now prefers the claiming plugin manifest ID over built-in channel aliases. (#77483)openclaw models auth list Command: Users can now inspect saved per-agent auth profiles without dumping secrets.pi-embedded-runner aborts runs when an agent emits the same (tool, args, result) triple repeatedly, preventing infinite tool-call loops. (Refs #77474; carries forward #21597)openclaw doctor --fix. (PR #74831)web-tree-sitter-backed shell command explainer has been added for future approval and command-review surfaces, capable of reporting top-level commands, nested commands, and risk markers. (PR #75004)400 Invalid option for reasoning_effort. Stale max thinking overrides are now mapped to xhigh. (PR #77423, fixes #77350)web_search in Sub-agents: Fixed web_search failing in sub-agent sessions with bundled providers by ensuring the bundled-provider lookup is config-driven and not session-registry-scoped. (Fixes #76416 via PR #76449)openclaw channels status and openclaw status --deep. Discord REST and gateway WebSocket startup paths now prefer IPv4, resolving stalls on IPv4-only networks. (PR #76327, fixes #75346, #77398)@newsletter outbound message targets are now supported with channel session metadata. (Fixes #13417)zalouser startup name matching is now gated by dangerouslyAllowNameMatching, ensuring display-name resolution only occurs when explicitly opted in. (PR #77411)before_agent_finalize retry instructions, SessionEntry slot projection, scoped trusted-policy session extension reads (PR #75609), and registerIfAbsent for atomic keyed-store dedupe claims.openclaw doctor --fix now better repairs legacy group chat configs, clears stale session routing state, and correctly installs official external plugins that are configured but not yet loaded. (Fixes #77400, #77155, #76095)sessions Output Capping: openclaw sessions output is now capped to the newest 100 rows by default, with --limit <n> or --limit all for more, preventing unbounded work on large session stores. (Fixes #77500)This release significantly enhances the OpenClaw platform across several critical dimensions:
This release includes several changes that may require attention during upgrade:
containers.json or browsers.json in ~/.openclaw/sandbox/), run openclaw doctor --fix after upgrading. This will migrate valid entries to the new sharded format and quarantine invalid legacy files. (PR #74831)zalouser configurations that use display names for allowFrom, groupAllowFrom, or groups in startup now explicitly require dangerouslyAllowNameMatching: true. If this flag is not enabled, these entries will not be resolved at startup. Stable ID entries are unaffected. (PR #77411)openclaw.json contains plugins.entries or plugins.allow entries for official external plugins that are not currently installed, the system will now emit catalog-backed install hints. This helps guide operators to openclaw plugins install <spec> rather than suggesting removal of valid configuration.plugins.bundledDiscovery is now more restrictive. Existing configurations will be migrated by doctor --fix to plugins.bundledDiscovery: "compat" to preserve current behavior.openclaw sessions Output Limit: The openclaw sessions command now defaults to showing the newest 100 rows. To view more, use --limit <n> or --limit all. (Fixes #77500)openclaw update process on Windows has been made more robust, particularly regarding npm package replacement and post-core plugin work. While this is a stability improvement, users experiencing issues with openclaw update on Windows should retry after this upgrade.400 Invalid option errors for reasoning_effort with DeepSeek V4 Pro on OpenRouter, this has been resolved. The system now correctly maps max thinking overrides to xhigh. No manual configuration change is typically needed, but ensure your thinkingDefault is set to an OpenRouter-supported value. (PR #77423, fixes #77350)For all other changes, the upgrade should be backward compatible without specific migration steps. As always, it is recommended to back up your ~/.openclaw directory before performing a major upgrade.