PicoClaw: Ultra-Efficient AI Assistant in Go

$10 Hardware · 10MB RAM · 1s Boot · 皮皮虾，我们走！

日本語 | English

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🦐 PicoClaw is an ultra-lightweight personal AI Assistant inspired by nanobot, refactored from the ground up in Go through a self-bootstrapping process, where the AI agent itself drove the entire architectural migration and code optimization.

⚡️ Runs on $10 hardware with <10MB RAM: That's 99% less memory than OpenClaw and 98% cheaper than a Mac mini!

📢 News

2026-02-09 🎉 PicoClaw Launched! Built in 1 day to bring AI Agents to $10 hardware with <10MB RAM. 🦐 皮皮虾，我们走！

✨ Features

🪶 Ultra-Lightweight: <10MB Memory footprint — 99% smaller than Clawdbot - core functionality.

💰 Minimal Cost: Efficient enough to run on $10 Hardware — 98% cheaper than a Mac mini.

⚡️ Lightning Fast: 400X Faster startup time, boot in 1 second even in 0.6GHz single core.

🌍 True Portability: Single self-contained binary across RISC-V, ARM, and x86, One-click to Go!

🤖 AI-Bootstrapped: Autonomous Go-native implementation — 95% Agent-generated core with human-in-the-loop refinement.

	OpenClaw	NanoBot	PicoClaw
Language	TypeScript	Python	Go
RAM	>1GB	>100MB	< 10MB
Startup (0.8GHz core)	>500s	>30s	<1s
Cost	Mac Mini 599$	Most Linux SBC ~50$	Any Linux Board As low as 10$

🦾 Demonstration

🛠️ Standard Assistant Workflows

🧩 Full-Stack Engineer	🗂️ Logging & Planning Management	🔎 Web Search & Learning
Develop • Deploy • Scale	Schedule • Automate • Memory	Discovery • Insights • Trends

🐜 Innovative Low-Footprint Deploy

PicoClaw can be deployed on almost any Linux device!

• $9.9 LicheeRV-Nano E(Ethernet) or W(WiFi6) version, for Minimal Home Assitant
• $30~50 NanoKVM, or $100 NanoKVM-Pro for Automated Server Maintenance
• $50 MaixCAM or $100 MaixCAM2 for Smart Monitoring

https://private-user-images.githubusercontent.com/83055338/547056448-e7b031ff-d6f5-4468-bcca-5726b6fecb5c.mp4

🌟 More Deployment Cases Await！

📦 Install

Install with precompiled binary

Download the firmware for your platform from the release page.

Install from source (latest features, recommended for development)

git clone https://github.com/sipeed/picoclaw.git

cd picoclaw
make deps

# Build, no need to install
make build

# Build for multiple platforms
make build-all

# Build And Install
make install

🐳 Docker Compose

You can also run PicoClaw using Docker Compose without installing anything locally.

Quick Start (Discord Bot)

# 1. Clone this repo
git clone https://github.com/Sunwood-AI-OSS-Hub/picoclaw.git
cd picoclaw

# 2. Set your API keys
cp config.example.json config/config.json
vim config/config.json      # Set DISCORD_BOT_TOKEN, API keys, etc.

# 3. Build & Start
docker compose --profile gateway up -d

# 4. Check logs
docker compose logs -f picoclaw-gateway

# 5. Stop
docker compose --profile gateway down

Agent Mode (One-shot)

# Ask a question
docker compose run --rm picoclaw-agent -m "What is 2+2?"

# Interactive mode
docker compose run --rm picoclaw-agent

Rebuild

docker compose --profile gateway build --no-cache
docker compose --profile gateway up -d

🚀 Quick Start

Tip

Set your API key in ~/.picoclaw/config.json. Get API keys: OpenRouter (LLM) · Zhipu (LLM) Web search is optional - get free Brave Search API (2000 free queries/month)

1. Initialize

picoclaw onboard

2. Configure (~/.picoclaw/config.json)

{
  "agents": {
    "defaults": {
      "workspace": "~/.picoclaw/workspace",
      "model": "glm-4.7",
      "max_tokens": 8192,
      "temperature": 0.7,
      "max_tool_iterations": 20
    }
  },
  "providers": {
    "openrouter": {
      "api_key": "xxx",
      "api_base": "https://open.bigmodel.cn/api/paas/v4"
    }
  },
  "tools": {
    "web": {
      "search": {
        "api_key": "YOUR_BRAVE_API_KEY",
        "max_results": 5
      }
    }
  }
}

3. Get API Keys

• LLM Provider: OpenRouter · Zhipu · Anthropic · OpenAI · Gemini
• Web Search (optional): Brave Search - Free tier available (2000 requests/month)

Note

: See config.example.json for a complete configuration template.

3. Chat

picoclaw agent -m "What is 2+2?"

That's it! You have a working AI assistant in 2 minutes.

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💬 Chat Apps

Talk to your picoclaw through Telegram

Channel	Setup
Telegram	Easy (just a token)
Discord	Easy (bot token + intents)

Telegram (Recommended)

1. Create a bot

• Open Telegram, search @BotFather
• Send /newbot, follow prompts
• Copy the token

2. Configure

{
  "channels": {
    "telegram": {
      "enabled": true,
      "token": "YOUR_BOT_TOKEN",
      "allowFrom": ["YOUR_USER_ID"]
    }
  }
}

Get your user ID from @userinfobot on Telegram.

3. Run

picoclaw gateway

Discord

1. Create a bot

• Go to https://discord.com/developers/applications
• Create an application → Bot → Add Bot
• Copy the bot token

2. Enable intents

• In the Bot settings, enable MESSAGE CONTENT INTENT
• (Optional) Enable SERVER MEMBERS INTENT if you plan to use allow lists based on member data

3. Get your User ID

• Discord Settings → Advanced → enable Developer Mode
• Right-click your avatar → Copy User ID

4. Configure

{
  "channels": {
    "discord": {
      "enabled": true,
      "token": "YOUR_BOT_TOKEN",
      "allowFrom": ["YOUR_USER_ID"]
    }
  }
}

5. Invite the bot

• OAuth2 → URL Generator
• Scopes: bot
• Bot Permissions: Send Messages, Read Message History
• Open the generated invite URL and add the bot to your server

6. Run

picoclaw gateway

Configuration

PicoClaw uses config.json for configuration.

1. Create Configuration File:

   Copy the example configuration file:

   cp config.example.json config/config.json
   

2. Edit Configuration:

   Open config/config.json and set your API keys and preferences.

   {
     "providers": {
       "openrouter": {
         "api_key": "sk-or-v1-..."
       }
     },
     "channels": {
       "discord": {
         "enabled": true,
         "token": "YOUR_DISCORD_BOT_TOKEN"
       }
     }
   }
   

3. Run

picoclaw agent -m "Hello"

Full config example

{
  "agents": {
    "defaults": {
      "model": "anthropic/claude-opus-4-5"
    }
  },
  "providers": {
    "openrouter": {
      "apiKey": "sk-or-v1-xxx"
    },
    "groq": {
      "apiKey": "gsk_xxx"
    }
  },
  "channels": {
    "telegram": {
      "enabled": true,
      "token": "123456:ABC...",
      "allowFrom": ["123456789"]
    },
    "discord": {
      "enabled": true,
      "token": "",
      "allow_from": [""]
    },
    "whatsapp": {
      "enabled": false
    },
    "feishu": {
      "enabled": false,
      "appId": "cli_xxx",
      "appSecret": "xxx",
      "encryptKey": "",
      "verificationToken": "",
      "allowFrom": []
    }
  },
  "tools": {
    "web": {
      "search": {
        "apiKey": "BSA..."
      }
    }
  }
}

CLI Reference

Command	Description
picoclaw onboard	Initialize config & workspace
picoclaw agent -m "..."	Chat with the agent
picoclaw agent	Interactive chat mode
picoclaw gateway	Start the gateway
picoclaw status	Show status

🤝 Contribute & Roadmap

PRs welcome! The codebase is intentionally small and readable. 🤗

discord: https://discord.gg/V4sAZ9XWpN

🐛 Troubleshooting

Web search says "API 配置问题"

This is normal if you haven't configured a search API key yet. PicoClaw will provide helpful links for manual searching.

To enable web search:

1. Get a free API key at https://brave.com/search/api (2000 free queries/month)
2. Add to ~/.picoclaw/config.json:

   {
     "tools": {
       "web": {
         "search": {
           "api_key": "YOUR_BRAVE_API_KEY",
           "max_results": 5
         }
       }
     }
   }
   

Getting content filtering errors

Some providers (like Zhipu) have content filtering. Try rephrasing your query or use a different model.

Telegram bot says "Conflict: terminated by other getUpdates"

This happens when another instance of the bot is running. Make sure only one picoclaw gateway is running at a time.

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📝 API Key Comparison

Service	Free Tier	Use Case
OpenRouter	200K tokens/month	Multiple models (Claude, GPT-4, etc.)
Zhipu	200K tokens/month	Best for Chinese users
Brave Search	2000 queries/month	Web search functionality
Groq	Free tier available	Fast inference (Llama, Mixtral)