What causes OpenClaw web_fetch memory leak?

Chrome renderer processes spawned by web_fetch are never terminated after use. They accumulate over time, eventually consuming all available RAM.

How much memory does the OpenClaw Chrome renderer leak use?

After 24 hours of normal use, 46 Chrome renderer processes consumed 2.6GB RAM on a 3.7GB VPS, reaching 91% RAM usage.

Will the OpenClaw web_fetch memory leak crash my server?

Yes, on constrained servers (4GB or less) this can cause OOM crashes within 24 hours of normal web_fetch usage.

How to fix OpenClaw Chrome renderer memory leak?

Manually kill orphaned Chrome processes periodically, or set up a cron job to clean up renderer processes. No official fix yet.

Is the OpenClaw web_fetch Chrome leak a known issue?

Yes, multiple GitHub issues document it (#70270, #29685, #11257). The problem has existed since early 2026 across versions.

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clawsmith.com/signal/openclaw-web-fetch-chrome-renderer-memory-leak

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OpenClaw web_fetch Chrome Renderer Processes Accumulate and Never Clean Up

When using web_fetch (headless Chrome browser tool), renderer processes accumulate over time and are never terminated. After 24 hours of normal use, Chrome renderer count grew to 46 processes consuming 2.6GB RAM on a 3.7GB VPS, causing OOM crashes.

Product Idea from this Signal

A CLI tool that snapshots your OpenClaw state before updates, runs the upgrade in a sandboxed dry-run against your live config, and auto-rolls back if any health check fails

1667.8k ▲

OpenClaw ships updates every 2-3 days and each one risks breaking exec permissions, crashing the gateway, saturating CPU with plugin loading bugs, or silently deleting cron jobs. Four separate regressions in April 2026 alone (v2026.4.1 sandbox, v2026.4.5 CPU, v2026.4.14 memory timeouts, update command wiping Feishu and crons) hit thousands of self-hosters with no rollback path. The built-in openclaw doctor only validates config schema after the fact. This tool wraps the entire update lifecycle: snapshot state, dry-run the upgrade against your actual agent/cron/channel config, diff the before/after, and block or auto-rollback if anything regresses.

CLIOPEN-SOURCEDEVTOOLSELF-HOSTEDRELIABILITY

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