Runtime reference
Hermes#
Hermes mirrors OpenClaw's architecture — gateway, cron, skills, memory, twenty-plus messaging platforms — but normalises its session store into SQLite with tokens and cost pre-computed per session.
| Runtime id | hermes |
| Category | OpenClaw-descendant agent |
| Vendor | Nous Research |
| Tier | Paid tier (Starter and up) |
| Upstream | github.com/NousResearch/hermes-agent |
Where the data comes from#
ClawMetry reads these locations, in order, and never writes to any of them.
~/.hermes/state.db— sessions and messages~/.hermes/skills/.usage.json— skill usage~/.hermes/cron/jobs.json— cron jobs~/.hermes/memories/*.md— agent memory~/.hermes/logs/errors.log— rotating structured logs
Format. Normalised SQLite (sessions + messages) in WAL mode.
Environment variables#
| Variable | Effect |
|---|---|
HERMES_HOME | home override |
See Environment variables for the variables that apply to every runtime.
Tokens and cost#
Tokens. Pre-computed per session by Hermes itself.
Cost. Pre-computed per session by Hermes itself.
Why this section exists
Runtimes differ enormously in what they persist. Rather than showing a plausible number everywhere, ClawMetry reports what the store actually contains and marks the rest unknown. A cost of $0.00 and a cost of unknown mean different things, and the dashboard keeps them different.
Sub-agents and delegation#
Sub-agents mirror OpenClaw's model.
Things worth knowing#
- Hermes exposes no local gateway port, so live tailing is a three-second SQLite poll rather than a socket.
- The database must never be opened with
immutable=1— that caches the file and the adapter stops seeing new writes.
Verify it is being read#
# Is this runtime detected, and would this install unlock it?
clawmetry runtimes --json | jq '.runtimes[] | select(.id=="hermes")'
# Why is it locked, if it is?
clawmetry runtimes --why hermes
# Any sessions ingested yet?
curl -s 'http://localhost:8900/api/local/sessions?limit=5' \
| jq '.rows[] | {session_id, agent_id, events, cost_usd}'If detection succeeds but no sessions appear, work through Troubleshooting — the usual causes are a relocated data directory (set the override above), a session limit that is hiding older runs, or a runtime that simply has not written anything yet.