Community guide

PM2 Process Persistence for WhatsApp Gateway Bot

How to configure PM2 to keep the OpenClaw WhatsApp session alive, handle runtime crashes, and sync server reboots on Ubuntu.

[!NOTE] ClawReady.in is an independent educational resource and setup service. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or operated by OpenClaw.

When running a WhatsApp automation bot via OpenClaw, any crash or server reboot will stop your bot. This guide outlines how I configured PM2 on Ubuntu to keep the processes running continuously in the background.

1. Installing PM2 Globally

First, ensure you have Node.js and NPM configured. Install PM2 globally:

sudo npm install pm2 -g

2. Setting Up the Gateway Daemon

Instead of launching the Gateway shell script manually, we can define a PM2 configuration ecosystem file (ecosystem.config.cjs) inside /opt/openclaw:

module.exports = {
  apps: [
    {
      name: 'openclaw-gateway',
      script: 'npm',
      args: 'run start',
      cwd: '/opt/openclaw',
      instances: 1,
      autorestart: true,
      watch: false,
      max_memory_restart: '800M',
      env: {
        NODE_ENV: 'production',
        PORT: '18789',
        HOST: '127.0.0.1' // Bind to localhost only!
      }
    }
  ]
};

[!WARNING] Port Warning: Ensure the HOST env parameter is set to 127.0.0.1 so that the Gateway process is bound strictly to the private loopback interface and not exposed to the public internet.

3. Starting the Daemon & Persistence

Start OpenClaw under PM2:
```
pm2 start ecosystem.config.cjs
```
Confirm the process is online:
```
pm2 list
```
Save the PM2 list state:
```
pm2 save
```
Configure PM2 to start automatically on system reboot:
```
pm2 startup
```
This command will print a specific block of shell commands to copy and execute on your system. Run that printed command with root permissions (using sudo) to register PM2 as a systemd boot service.

4. Monitoring WhatsApp Bot Health

To view the live console outputs of your WhatsApp bot and scanning events:

pm2 logs openclaw-gateway

If the WhatsApp session disconnects or the Node process crashes, PM2 will restart the worker in under a second automatically.