Environment variables

OpenRAG recognizes environment variables from the following sources:

• Environment variables - Values set in the .env file.
• Langflow runtime overrides - Langflow components may tweak environment variables at runtime.
• Default or fallback values - These values are default or fallback values if OpenRAG doesn't find a value.

Configure environment variables

Environment variables are set in a .env file in the root of your OpenRAG project directory.

For an example .env file, see .env.example in the OpenRAG repository.

The Docker Compose files are populated with values from your .env, so you don't need to edit the Docker Compose files manually.

Environment variables always take precedence over other variables.

Set environment variables

To set environment variables, do the following.

1. Stop OpenRAG.
2. Set the values in the .env file:

   LOG_LEVEL=DEBUG
   LOG_FORMAT=json
   SERVICE_NAME=openrag-dev

3. Start OpenRAG.

Updating provider API keys or provider endpoints in the .env file will not take effect after Application onboarding. To change these values, you must:

1. Stop OpenRAG.
2. Remove the containers:

   docker-compose down

3. Update the values in your .env file.
4. Start OpenRAG containers.

   docker-compose up -d

5. Complete Application onboarding again.

Supported environment variables

All OpenRAG configuration can be controlled through environment variables.

AI provider settings

Configure which AI models and providers OpenRAG uses for language processing and embeddings. For more information, see Application onboarding.

Variable	Default	Description
EMBEDDING_MODEL	text-embedding-3-small	Embedding model for vector search.
LLM_MODEL	gpt-4o-mini	Language model for the chat agent.
MODEL_PROVIDER	openai	Model provider, such as OpenAI or IBM watsonx.ai.
OPENAI_API_KEY	-	Your OpenAI API key. Required.
PROVIDER_API_KEY	-	API key for the model provider.
PROVIDER_ENDPOINT	-	Custom provider endpoint. Only used for IBM or Ollama providers.
PROVIDER_PROJECT_ID	-	Project ID for providers. Only required for the IBM watsonx.ai provider.

Document processing

Control how OpenRAG processes and ingests documents into your knowledge base. For more information, see Ingestion.

Variable	Default	Description
CHUNK_OVERLAP	200	Overlap between chunks.
CHUNK_SIZE	1000	Text chunk size for document processing.
DISABLE_INGEST_WITH_LANGFLOW	false	Disable Langflow ingestion pipeline.
DOCLING_OCR_ENGINE	-	OCR engine for document processing.
OCR_ENABLED	false	Enable OCR for image processing.
OPENRAG_DOCUMENTS_PATHS	./documents	Document paths for ingestion.
PICTURE_DESCRIPTIONS_ENABLED	false	Enable picture descriptions.

Langflow settings

Configure Langflow authentication.

Variable	Default	Description
LANGFLOW_AUTO_LOGIN	False	Enable auto-login for Langflow.
LANGFLOW_CHAT_FLOW_ID	pre-filled	This value is pre-filled. The default value is found in .env.example.
LANGFLOW_ENABLE_SUPERUSER_CLI	False	Enable superuser CLI.
LANGFLOW_INGEST_FLOW_ID	pre-filled	This value is pre-filled. The default value is found in .env.example.
LANGFLOW_KEY	auto-generated	Explicit Langflow API key.
LANGFLOW_NEW_USER_IS_ACTIVE	False	New users are active by default.
LANGFLOW_PUBLIC_URL	http://localhost:7860	Public URL for Langflow.
LANGFLOW_SECRET_KEY	-	Secret key for Langflow internal operations.
LANGFLOW_SUPERUSER	-	Langflow admin username. Required.
LANGFLOW_SUPERUSER_PASSWORD	-	Langflow admin password. Required.
LANGFLOW_URL	http://localhost:7860	Langflow URL.
NUDGES_FLOW_ID	pre-filled	This value is pre-filled. The default value is found in .env.example.
SYSTEM_PROMPT	"You are a helpful AI assistant with access to a knowledge base. Answer questions based on the provided context."	System prompt for the Langflow agent.

OAuth provider settings

Configure OAuth providers and external service integrations.

Variable	Default	Description
AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID / AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY	-	AWS integrations.
GOOGLE_OAUTH_CLIENT_ID / GOOGLE_OAUTH_CLIENT_SECRET	-	Google OAuth authentication.
MICROSOFT_GRAPH_OAUTH_CLIENT_ID / MICROSOFT_GRAPH_OAUTH_CLIENT_SECRET	-	Microsoft OAuth.
WEBHOOK_BASE_URL	-	Base URL for webhook endpoints.

OpenSearch settings

Configure OpenSearch database authentication.

Variable	Default	Description
OPENSEARCH_HOST	localhost	OpenSearch host.
OPENSEARCH_PASSWORD	-	Password for OpenSearch admin user. Required.
OPENSEARCH_PORT	9200	OpenSearch port.
OPENSEARCH_USERNAME	admin	OpenSearch username.

System settings

Configure general system components, session management, and logging.

Variable	Default	Description
LANGFLOW_KEY_RETRIES	15	Number of retries for Langflow key generation.
LANGFLOW_KEY_RETRY_DELAY	2.0	Delay between retries in seconds.
LANGFLOW_VERSION	latest	Langflow Docker image version.
LOG_FORMAT	-	Log format (set to "json" for JSON output).
LOG_LEVEL	INFO	Logging level (DEBUG, INFO, WARNING, ERROR).
MAX_WORKERS	-	Maximum number of workers for document processing.
OPENRAG_VERSION	latest	OpenRAG Docker image version.
SERVICE_NAME	openrag	Service name for logging.
SESSION_SECRET	auto-generated	Session management.

Langflow runtime overrides

Langflow runtime overrides allow you to modify component settings at runtime without changing the base configuration.

Runtime overrides are implemented through tweaks - parameter modifications that are passed to specific Langflow components during flow execution.

For more information on tweaks, see Input schema (tweaks).

Default values and fallbacks

When no environment variables or configuration file values are provided, OpenRAG uses default values. These values can be found in the code base at the following locations.

OpenRAG configuration defaults

These values are defined in config_manager.py in the OpenRAG repository.

System configuration defaults

These fallback values are defined in settings.py in the OpenRAG repository.