News API Aggregator MCP server

The News MCP Server is a smart news search server that automatically switches between multiple news APIs when one reaches its limit, ensuring reliable news fetching without worrying about API limits. It supports multiple free news APIs, tracks quota usage, and works with multiple languages.

Installation

Clone and Setup

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/guangxiangdebizi/news-mcp.git
cd news-mcp

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Copy environment template
cp .env.example .env

API Configuration

Get free API keys from any of these services (more keys provide better reliability):

• TheNewsAPI: Unlimited* - Get Key (Highest Priority)
• NewsData.io: ~200 requests - Get Key (High Priority)
• NewsAPI.org: 100 requests - Get Key (Medium Priority)
• GNews: 100 requests - Get Key (Medium Priority)
• Twingly: Trial available - Get Key (Low Priority)

*Claimed unlimited for free tier

Configure Environment

Edit the .env file and add your API keys:

# Add at least one API key (more is better for reliability)
THE_NEWS_API_KEY=your_api_key_here
NEWSDATA_IO_KEY=your_api_key_here
NEWSAPI_ORG_KEY=your_api_key_here
GNEWS_API_KEY=your_api_key_here
TWINGLY_API_KEY=your_api_key_here

Build and Run

# Build the project
npm run build

# Start the MCP server
npm start

# Or run in development mode
npm run dev

Usage

With Claude Desktop

Add to your Claude Desktop configuration:

Stdio Mode (Local Development):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "news-mcp": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["path/to/news-mcp/build/index.js"]
    }
  }
}

SSE Mode (Web Access):

# Start SSE server
npm run sse

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "news-mcp": {
      "type": "sse",
      "url": "http://localhost:3100/sse",
      "timeout": 600
    }
  }
}

Available Tools

search_news

Search for news articles with automatic API switching.

Parameters:

• query (required): Search keywords or topics
• language (optional): Language code (default: "en")
• limit (optional): Number of articles (1-10, default: 5)

Example:

// Search for technology news
{
  "query": "artificial intelligence",
  "language": "en",
  "limit": 5
}

// Search for Chinese news
{
  "query": "科技新闻",
  "language": "zh",
  "limit": 3
}

How Smart Switching Works

1. Priority Order: APIs are tried in order of reliability and quota limits
2. Quota Tracking: System tracks daily usage for each API
3. Automatic Failover: When an API fails or reaches limit, automatically tries the next one
4. Success Guarantee: Continues until successful response or all APIs exhausted

The system follows this priority order:

TheNewsAPI (∞) → NewsData.io (200) → NewsAPI.org (100) → GNews (100) → Twingly (50)

Supported Languages

• English (en) - All APIs
• Chinese (zh) - Most APIs
• Spanish (es) - Most APIs
• French (fr) - Most APIs
• German (de) - Most APIs
• And 15+ more languages

How to install this MCP server

For Claude Code

To add this MCP server to Claude Code, run this command in your terminal:

claude mcp add-json "news-mcp" '{"command":"node","args":["path/to/news-mcp/build/index.js"]}'

See the official Claude Code MCP documentation for more details.

For Cursor

There are two ways to add an MCP server to Cursor. The most common way is to add the server globally in the ~/.cursor/mcp.json file so that it is available in all of your projects.

If you only need the server in a single project, you can add it to the project instead by creating or adding it to the .cursor/mcp.json file.

Adding an MCP server to Cursor globally

To add a global MCP server go to Cursor Settings > Tools & Integrations and click "New MCP Server".

When you click that button the ~/.cursor/mcp.json file will be opened and you can add your server like this:

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "news-mcp": {
            "command": "node",
            "args": [
                "path/to/news-mcp/build/index.js"
            ]
        }
    }
}

Adding an MCP server to a project

To add an MCP server to a project you can create a new .cursor/mcp.json file or add it to the existing one. This will look exactly the same as the global MCP server example above.

How to use the MCP server

Once the server is installed, you might need to head back to Settings > MCP and click the refresh button.

The Cursor agent will then be able to see the available tools the added MCP server has available and will call them when it needs to.

You can also explicitly ask the agent to use the tool by mentioning the tool name and describing what the function does.

For Claude Desktop

To add this MCP server to Claude Desktop:

1. Find your configuration file:

• macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
• Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json
• Linux: ~/.config/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

2. Add this to your configuration file:

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "news-mcp": {
            "command": "node",
            "args": [
                "path/to/news-mcp/build/index.js"
            ]
        }
    }
}

3. Restart Claude Desktop for the changes to take effect