Set Up OpenClaw on Hetzner Cloud

Quick Overview

Hetzner Cloud offers some of the best price-to-performance in the industry. Their CX22 plan gives you 2 vCPUs, 4 GB RAM, and 40 GB NVMe for around $4.51/mo. You can use the web console or the hcloud CLI for setup.

Option A: Web Console Setup

1. Sign up at hetzner.com/cloud
2. Create a new project
3. Click Add Server
4. Choose location (Falkenstein, Nuremberg, Helsinki, or Ashburn)
5. Select Ubuntu 24.04 image
6. Pick CX22 (2 vCPU, 4 GB RAM) — ~$4.51/mo
7. Add your SSH key (or set a root password)
8. Click Create & Buy Now

Option B: hcloud CLI Setup

# Install hcloud CLI (macOS)
brew install hcloud

# Or on Linux
curl -fsSL https://github.com/hetznercloud/cli/releases/latest/download/hcloud-linux-amd64.tar.gz | tar xz
sudo mv hcloud /usr/local/bin/

# Authenticate
hcloud context create openclaw

# Create server
hcloud server create \
  --name openclaw \
  --type cx22 \
  --image ubuntu-24.04 \
  --location fsn1 \
  --ssh-key your-key-name

Step 2: SSH In and Install Docker

ssh root@YOUR_SERVER_IP

# Update packages
apt update && apt upgrade -y

# Install Docker
curl -fsSL https://get.docker.com | sh
apt install -y docker-compose-plugin

docker --version

Step 3: Deploy OpenClaw

mkdir -p /opt/openclaw && cd /opt/openclaw
cat > docker-compose.yml << 'EOF'
services:
  openclaw:
    image: ghcr.io/nicepkg/openclaw:latest
    container_name: openclaw
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - "3000:3000"
    volumes:
      - ./data:/app/data
    environment:
      - OPENAI_API_KEY=your-api-key-here
      - GATEWAY_TOKEN=your-secret-token
EOF

docker compose up -d

Environment Variables

Verify It's Running

docker compose ps
docker compose logs -f openclaw
curl http://localhost:3000

Common Issues

Firewall blocking access: Hetzner's built-in firewall is off by default, but if you enabled it, allow TCP 3000: hcloud firewall add-rule your-fw --direction in --protocol tcp --port 3000 --source-ips 0.0.0.0/0 --source-ips ::/0

Server location matters: Pick Falkenstein (fsn1) or Nuremberg (nbg1) for best EU latency, Ashburn (ash) for US users.

Hourly billing: Hetzner bills hourly, so you can spin up a test server, try OpenClaw, and delete it — costs just a few cents.