firecrawl/open-lovable · error · Error

Firecrawl API key not configured

Error message

Firecrawl API key not configured

What it means

A guard-clause error thrown before any network call when `process.env.FIRECRAWL_API_KEY` is unset or empty. The route requires a Firecrawl API key to extract branding data and refuses to run without one, surfacing a clear configuration error instead of a 401 from Firecrawl.

Source

Thrown at app/api/extract-brand-styles/route.ts:17

import { NextRequest, NextResponse } from 'next/server';

export async function POST(request: NextRequest) {
  try {
    const body = await request.json();
    const url = body.url;
    const prompt = body.prompt;

    console.log('[extract-brand-styles] Extracting brand styles for:', url);
    console.log('[extract-brand-styles] User prompt:', prompt);

    // Call Firecrawl API to extract branding information
    const FIRECRAWL_API_KEY = process.env.FIRECRAWL_API_KEY;

    if (!FIRECRAWL_API_KEY) {
      console.error('[extract-brand-styles] No Firecrawl API key found');
      throw new Error('Firecrawl API key not configured');
    }

    console.log('[extract-brand-styles] Calling Firecrawl branding API for:', url);

    const firecrawlResponse = await fetch('https://api.firecrawl.dev/v2/scrape', {
      method: 'POST',
      headers: {
        'Authorization': `Bearer ${FIRECRAWL_API_KEY}`,
        'Content-Type': 'application/json',
      },
      body: JSON.stringify({
        url: url,
        formats: ['branding'],
      }),
    });

    if (!firecrawlResponse.ok) {
      const errorText = await firecrawlResponse.text();

View on GitHub (pinned to 69bd93bae7)

Solutions

1. Set FIRECRAWL_API_KEY in your environment (.env.local locally, hosting provider dashboard in production) and restart the server/redeploy
2. Verify the variable name is spelled exactly FIRECRAWL_API_KEY with no stray spaces
3. Confirm the env file is actually loaded (Next.js loads .env.local at startup only, not mid-session)
4. Get a valid key from the Firecrawl dashboard if the existing one was revoked

Example fix

// .env.local
// before
# (FIRECRAWL_API_KEY missing)
// after
FIRECRAWL_API_KEY=fc-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

if (!process.env.FIRECRAWL_API_KEY) {
  throw new Error('Set FIRECRAWL_API_KEY before calling /api/extract-brand-styles');
}

function hasFirecrawlKey(env: NodeJS.ProcessEnv): env is NodeJS.ProcessEnv & { FIRECRAWL_API_KEY: string } {
  return typeof env.FIRECRAWL_API_KEY === 'string' && env.FIRECRAWL_API_KEY.length > 0;
}

try {
  const styles = await fetch('/api/extract-brand-styles', { method: 'POST', body });
} catch (e) {
  if (e.message.includes('API key not configured')) {
    // surface setup instructions to the user instead of retrying
  }
  throw e;
}

When it happens

Trigger: POST /api/extract-brand-styles where the deployment has no FIRECRAWL_API_KEY environment variable set (or it's set to an empty string), so the `if (!FIRECRAWL_API_KEY)` guard fires.

Common situations: Forgetting to add the key to .env.local in development; not adding it in the hosting dashboard (Vercel env vars); adding it only to a preview environment; misspelling the variable name.

Understand the failure class

Background: "environment variable is not set" and "Missing keys in environment" errors: what missing required env var messages mean and how to fix them — this error's family across 28 libraries.

Related errors

• FIRECRAWL_API_KEY environment variable is not set
• MORPH_API_KEY is not set
• Firecrawl API returned ${firecrawlResponse.status}
• No branding data in Firecrawl response
• Failed to capture screenshot

AI-assisted analysis of firecrawl/open-lovable@69bd93bae7 (2026-08-28). Data as JSON: /api/errors/0efb7d578d14ec43. Report an issue: GitHub.